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Super 8 is sci-fi fantasy fulfillment at its most complete. Like the finest of wine-accompanying meals, J.J. Abrams’ sleek homage to the feel and look of the classic films directed and/or produced Steven Spielberg (the ones from my youth) is extremely satisfying. The film – each and every morsel – registers for thirty-something-year-olds as an epic middle finger to all those mass-media critics who were left unaffected by E.T., confused by Close Encounters of the Third Kind; those who huffed at Gremlins, pooh-poohed Amazing Stories, decried the heart of *batteries not included or labeled The Goonies as far too noisy for good taste as the film and its director see nothing wrong in celebrating the cinematic heart of the adventurous adolescent. Indeed, Super 8 is a stunning achievement that takes its viewers back to a time period where adventure - not cell phones – ruled the school.
The year is 1979. The town: Lillian, Ohio. An accident at a factory has left Deputy Sheriff Jackson Lamb (Kyle Chandler) without a wife and his soft-spoken son, Joe (Joel Courtney) without a mother. As the days and months pass, a distance grows between father and son. Joe finds escape in model trains and make-up effects for his best friend’s Super 8 zombie film, The Case. Charles (Riley Griffiths) fancies himself as a director and stuffs himself on French fries and George A. Romero films. He also fancies – as does Joe – Alice Dainard (Elle Fanning) and sees her as perfect as the love interest in his film. The rest of the middle-school aged gang – Carey (Ryan Lee), who likes blowing things up, Preston (Zach Mills), and Martin (Gabriel Basso) – are just content to be a part of the film and sneak off for midnight shoots.
On one of these secret shoots, the Super 8 camera records something it shouldn’t have: a massive train wreck whose mysterious contents the United States Air Force are desperately trying to keep under wraps. Their presence at the crash only alerts the town that something is wrong; something has escaped. The boys, while waiting for their film to be processed, puzzle over the final words of Dr, Woodward (Glynn Turman), their teacher who caused the wreck. Tensions spike as strange things begin to happen at night.
Soon enough, the Air Force – represented here by the stern leadership Colonel Nelec (Noah Emmerich) - descends upon the town. Dogs go missing. People, too. Power surges plague the town and, one by one, the boys find themselves at the center of a mystery that, deftly enough, reveals all through a hole in a young boy’s wall. Super 8 is the thrilling throwback its super secret advertising campaign suggests.
Rest assured, simple nostalgia is not Abrams only flexed muscle. Yes, this movie reads as a certified postage-stamped love letter to the Spielberg films of the past but, due to its narrative and its inherit intelligence, Super 8 hoists a weight of much more. Compromised of incredible establishing shots of houses and well-timed sequences of destruction, Super 8 earns its clearance as a legitimate film of adventurous science fiction in that it knows it offers what other summer features don’t: an authentic and poignant arc of soul that resonates against its extraterrestrial backdrop. It’s a sincere blockbuster; the type of movie Hollywood doesn’t make anymore.
And it’s a film that easily could have failed. If it was all – even its emotional nuances – patterned as a paint-by-numbers project or solely as a movie mash-up: The Goonies meet Cloverfield, the movie would have folded in on itself. Abrams, who also wrote the movie, would have been dismissed as a mere mime and not celebrated as the clever director that he apparently is. He single-handedly saved Mission Impossible III, brought Star Trek back to life and, now, with Super 8 gives fans a moving creature feature that hearkens back to a by-gone era of filmmaking now replaced with a summer season of films aimed to push iPods, iPads, and iPhones, with little care for iNtelligence or iHeart.
Abrams resurrects Walter Cronkite and dusts him off for broadcast news, surrounds us with wood-encased television sets in carpeted living rooms, puts Three-Mile Island back in the headlines, and introduces audiences to a device called The Walkman. As the script suggests, this is a “slippery slope” and, with the inclusion of a gang of smart-aleck kids that today’s filmmakers and scriptwriters NEVER get right, absolutely nails the era and the comradery without falling victim to its own concept.
Much like The Goonies, Super 8 doesn’t feel completely comfortable being labeled as a kids movie and fights against that label; the language is harsh, there’s (thankfully) extreme and shocking violence, and even moments of pot smoking teenagers. Everything, alongside a soundtrack full of ELO and The Knack and Blondie songs, is presented with unrefined joy. Even the score, written by Michael Giacchino, reaches back to the pantheon of John Williams and gives us moments of melody to remember.
Super 8 is proof positive of cinematic inspiration drawn from late 70s and early 80s source material; a rare film that immediately joins the ranks of those it emulates. Here, at the helm of the film, we have one of the brightest filmmakers in recent years making a statement about the power and journey of film with a new tale told with a giant tipping of the hat toward the work and influence of Steven Spielberg and the films produced by Amblin Entertainment.
Sadly, teenagers and kids don’t seem to devour movies like this anymore. Cynicism is injected into their bloodstream at too soon an age. Their concentration powers have been diminished by fancy gadgets and Michael Bay films. My hope is that this film and its message does well and encourages them to appreciate the artistry of filmmaking – not as one massive explosion of sexuality and fire – but as the emotional journey that it can be when done correctly. Let them be niave and young and open to the possibility of, dare I suggest it, hope.
Super 8 might be an ode to the space-fueled optimistic films of the once young Steven Spielberg but its heart is firmly grounded in the soil of belief that sometimes – and rather thankfully - you can go back again.
