PG-13, 1 hr. 51 min.
Directed By: J.J. Abrams. Release Date:
Jun 10, 2011. DVD Release
Date: Nov 22, 2011.
I was, well, totally stoked when Super 8 appeared in my Netflix shipment
du jour. Or, well, I guess de la semaine,
considering I go through about three a week, and I don’t have a constant
rotation going. Everyone I know who saw
this movie loved it, and even the folks that I don’t know, but whose input I
seek when I go to think about a movie were pretty much raving about this movie.
I get why.
Abrams brought us a story and a setting that harkened to a… spirit that
hasn’t been present in live action movies in a long, long time. Super 8
reminded me so strongly of the movies of my childhood in the 80s that I almost
didn’t know what to think. There’s an
innocence to the film that’s almost too much to pass up on. It was empowering somehow. I just FELT better while watching this
movie. It didn’t matter that there was
an alien running around eating people and that there were terrible train wrecks
and such going on.
To say that I loved this movie would be an
understatement. It brought on memories
of ET, The Goonies, and way too many other movies that I love because they
remind me of a time when my life wasn’t so stressful. Super 8
totally had me, and totally despite its flaws.
I still don’t get where the title came from. There wasn’t even a Super 8 hotel anywhere in the movie. I’m sure I could research it and figure it
out, but that feels too much like work. The
movie totally sucked me in until the last few minutes, when everything seemed
to fall completely into the abyss.
I hated the ending of this movie nearly as much as I
loved the rest. It was weak, a too-easy
tug at the heartstrings, and entirely too predictable for my personal
taste. It’s what kept this from being
much higher on my list of favorite 2011 movies,
