Shadow in the Cloud

Shadow in the Cloud: Feels like a mix between the Amazing Stories episode "The Mission", The Twilight Zone episode Nightmare at 20,000 Feet and Memphis Belle, with even a homage to Aliens. Maude (Chloe Grace Moretz) hitches a ride on a B-17 going from Auckland to Samoa, she's carrying secret documents but even though she's a WAAF pilot the crew give her a hard time. She has to go into the belly bubble gun-turret for take off but ends up being trapped there. Then a gremlin, a large bat/rat/ape creature appears and starts damaging a wing and attacking her turret, the crew disbelieve her at first. Much of the action is based in the bubble and the outside of the plane, with the airmen only being heard over the intercom until Moretz gets back into the fuselage. It's not just the monster that they have to fear though, Japanese Zeros also attack. The gremlin is quite convincing as are the hand to hand battles with it and the dog fights with the Zeros. Some of the events do require a suspension of disbelief but Moretz literally kicks gremlin, misogynist and Zero ass. A couple of interesting plot twists makes this into an Air Ace scary pulp story. Directed and Co-written by Roseanne Liang. 7/10.

There are so many things wrong with this movie. I rolled my eyes many times. Some parts were so dumb that i had to pause the movie in order to process what happened. The entire premise is ridiculous, and so many things that happen are absurd. Whoever made this doesn't understand the most basic laws of physics. And they overdid it with the message

having said all that, i was never bored. In fact, i was invested. And there is one, let's call it, subplot. That subplot doesn't seem to fit in this movie at all. And yet it was the most stupidly entertaining aspect of the movie. (1 viewing, 6/7/2021)

"Shadow in the Cloud" has the honor of being the first major movie release of 2021, on the very first of January, and it was very welcome as far as I'm concerned. It is an often choice for studios to drop the movies they don't have a lotta faith in early in the year, and, as expected (courtesy of the so-so trailer), "Shadow in the Cloud" is a flawed adventure, but an entertaining one. To me it seems that critics woke up in such excellent spirits that the flaws are easier to assign less weight to, and the general audience is getting hanged up on gender problems of this film, a film that doesn't demand an in-depth analysis or much arguing. It is someplace inbetween, where this shlocky B voyage lands itself.

Flight Officer Garrett (Chloe Grace Moretz) has a secret mission, and an assignment to join Captain Reeves's team on his plane, aptly named "The Fool's Errand". Guys are, of course, shocked seeing a woman climb on-board, and for much of the movie, "Shadow in the Cloud" will poke a lot of fun at men being stupid and naughty, wherein lies the bothers of all those 1/10 reviews. As the crew is making peace with their newest addition, they put her in the "aquarium" or the small cockpit with big guns under the plane. This is where we'll spend first half of the film, the set-up a.k.a. the better part of the film.

Full disclosure, "Shadow in the Cloud" is hardly ever realistic or very hard on serious social commentary, it's a B-kind of shlock horror, just without much horror in this case, but the mechanics of the world are comic-book worthy, and, as a sum, it is mostly self-aware popcorn fun, infused with women-empowering lead like many exploitation flicks in the decades before this.

And so "Shadow in the Cloud" has just enough fun, somehow mostly exactly when camera doesn't leave Chloe stuck in that cockpit for the first two acts. The plot, however slowly and shallowly, develops from there, through the commendable acting of Chloe Grace Moretz. Such a solid performance definitely deserved a better movie, but it also helps a worse one. Say what You will, but she's a fine actress. So, carrying a lot of emotion and not very surprising twists, she fights jokesters and gremlins, the latter of which ultimately has very little place and meaning in "Shadow in the Cloud". The horror element rests. The third act is all bullets, explosions, fights and deaths, but it's also the least surprising and least tense act. Gremlins are also the only manifestations of iffy cgi, graphical inconsistencies. Style is a 50/50 factor for this movie, I liked the cinematography, and the synth hey-it's-the-80's soundtrack, though I couldn't figure if it feels displaced or not. For a movie tributing the 80's, it's not 80's enough. Though, being over-the-top and a little ridiculous, maybe it is 80's enough... Sound editing is odd at times, during scenes outside of a flying plane, where there should be screams of skies storming, we kind of have an awkward silence, as if a couple sound layers were muted.

There's a trivial backstory on why perhaps there's such discussion and dissatisfaction with the feminist nature of this film, it was originally written by Max Landis. Max Landis is now dealing with allegations of sexual abuse, and the script got heavily rewritten by director Roseanne Liang. You may entertain a couple of scenarios with this information, but personally I don't see any big problems with "Shadow in the Cloud" in regards to what's being so criticized.

"Shadow in the Cloud" is more expensive looking B blockbuster, straight-forward popcorn entertainment, a typical but thin creature feature, a ww2 action romp in the skies, and, really, not the worst offering in the first days of new hope. 2021, I mean. My rating: 5/10.

Before watching this, I looked a bit into those really bad reviews here. So I decided to get the experience myself... And it was quite good. I did like those dialogues over intercom very much. Once in a uniform, some men think they are oblieged to talk...well, like idiots. There's similiar idiotic talk I heard myself during the time I served, decades ago. But the movie isn't about how idiotic men can be, but what a certain group of women can do, if they have to, at least about what we believe they can do. However, the movie continued to surprise me, the climbing scene was completeley captivating, I liked even becoming a bit dizzy...after that I thought 'Why do people hate this movie so much ? - It's just crazy !" (and not ludicruous, of course unrealistic, but nevertheless very effective). People seem to hate the movie because of the supernatural element. And I agree, mostly, that this was just a bad idea, which draws the movie "down" from its potential class, which would be "wartime drama" and is much more respectable than "fantasy action". However, technically there is not much to criticise, camera, cut, direction, music, fx, all decent, and of course, we can see that Chloe is able to singlehandedly carry a movie. So, I give 8 Stars. Wait, 8 ? That's a very good movie in my ranking system - how could that be ? Well, because I did like the freshness and the lighthearted verve of this little gem. And the little thing in the bag ;-)

First things first, if you complain about unbelievable things happening in a movie about gremlins attacking an airplane, you need to have your opinion license permanently revoked.

"Shadow in the Cloud" is obviously meant to be viewed as a simple comic book style rip-roaring WWII adventure to be enjoyed like a cheeseburger or a pint of ice cream and not to be deeply analyzed for plot depth and realism. The hordes of egotists falling over themselves to prove how "above it all" they are need to loosen up and switch to decaff. Yes, absolutely ludicrous things happen in this movie, and that's what makes it fun! Is everyone really so hopped up on dopamine from constantly scrolling through social media that they can't let go and enjoy a zany movie?

Chloe Moretz' performance was captivating and thrilling from start to finish. These are the kind of roles she was born to play and it was clear that she had an absolute blast making the movie. The rest of the cast were clearly there to be functional, forgettable cardboard cutouts, and the energy of the movie would have suffered if they'd been directed to draw attention away from the main character.

I'm confident that in a decade this movie will be found on film lists under the heading "Cult movies that were despised on release". I'd love to see a sequel!