Super 8 (2001, PG-13)

It's clear from the beginning that Super 8 is a homage to Steven Spielberg.  Super 8 echoes back to the good ole Spielberg pictures like Jaws, Close Encounters of the Third Kind, E.T and Jurassic Park.  Spielberg produced this pic while J.J Abrams directed.  Previously, I was not overly impressed by Abrams' directing style in Mission Impossible III or the rebooted Star Trek.  Super 8 is a better film then either of the two, and it's also the film where Abrams has found his place as a director.

Super 8 delivers us delightful sci-fi entertainment.  It's not anywhere near a classic like it might want to be, but it's a movie that deserves to be released as 2011 is fast becoming one of the weakest movie years in decades.  All I'm seeing are action pics, a few of them quite mindless.  And yet, Super 8 isn't that way.  It's a movie that focuses more development on it's characters then the action and the space alien.  It's a movie that's character driven.  For 2011, that's a first.

Everyone probably knows this, but I might as well mention that the title refers to Super 8 cameras used in the 70s and the 80s.  That reminds me, Super 8 so well accomplishes the look and feel for the late 70s.  The city, the cars, the costumes, the music...are all top notch.  Super 8 makes some use and effort out of production value, something that is hinted in the movie itself when one of the teenage characters says it's all about production value when coming to movies.  He's right.

Yes, Super 8 is formulaic.  It plays out just like we would expect.  In that sense, it offers nothing new (even though the special effects are top notch), but only echoes back to some of the old and fun sci-fi collection of films.  There's a bus attack by the space alien that reminded me all to well of the T-Rex attack in Jurassic Park.  While not leaving near as much an emotional impact, the alien taking off into space reminded me of E.T.  And Abrams so succeeds in not showing the alien beast until the last minute, meaning that it causes much more of an effect, just in fashion in how it was done in Jaws, where the shark was rarelly seen.  Abrams listened to what Spielberg was teaching him.  Spielberg's shadow is present everywhere, and Abrams is the one directing it.  

Super 8 is a nice, fashionable slice of entertainment, with plenty of humor and sci-fi action for all.  So far, it's the only pleasing 2011 summer popcorn film, and a more then welcome deference to the good ole days.

                    ****/5