Shadow in the Cloud should be a whole lot better than it actually is. It stars a talented actress, it has a screenplay co-written by Max Landis, and it tries so hard to offer a feminist voice. Unfortunately, all of those otherwise talented elements and good intentions are violently overshadowed by tunnel-vision direction, repetitive & ugly dialogue, and a plot device that serves so little purpose that if it were removed from the movie entirely, practically nothing would be lost. To say this movie was disappointing would be a gross understatement. It was aggravatingly awful and unintentionally funny for all the wrong reasons. This is one plane ride I wish I never took.
Set in WW2, the story follows a young woman named Maude (Chloe Grace Moretz), who has official orders to board an army plane with a mysterious package as part of a top-secret mission. After dealing with the aggressively sexist soldier boys, she is forced into the lower gun turret of the plane: a veritable death trap on account of their infamous flimsiness. While doing her best to deal with the overtly sexist soldiers on the plane, she notices a few enemy planes stalking them from the clouds. Despite her efforts to warn the others of a potential threat, her words are disregarded as “hysteria” and promptly ignored. It’s not until she takes action by firing at the enemy plane as it attacks returning fire that the misogynist idiots finally take her seriously. This is especially helpful since, in addition to dealing with the enemy planes, they also have to contend against a mysterious monster tearing apart the plane. Will they survive the terror at ten thousand feet? I don’t know, but I do know that Rod Serling must be rolling in his grave!
This movie does more things wrong than it does well. While the attempted commentary about sexism in the military is appreciated, and the story's general idea is genuinely interesting, its overall execution betrays everything the movie wants to do.
The first issue is that over two-thirds of the film takes place inside the bottom turret, with the camera staying on Maude and her occasional P.O.V (Point Of View). This is a visual tactic normally reserved for clever character pieces working with a limited budget, i.e., films like 7500, or Buried, or a good episode of The Twilight Zone. While it is a clever idea that can create visceral entertainment when executed properly, there is no justification for its use in this story. Since the film clearly had a big enough budget for WW2 era sets & costumes, six additional cast members, and special-effects for aerial combat, plus a monster, there is no narratively sound reason, nor technical justification, for nearly two-thirds of the movie to remain in a single isolated location. There was plenty of opportunity for scenes with the other actors to cut between Maude’s isolation to create visual variety. Instead, we’re stuck with Maude trying to duke it out against a giant creature while trapped in a bubble made of metal and glass. Exciting! (he said sarcastically)
Speaking of the monster, it is probably the most useless plot device in the entire film. It serves no purpose other than to artificially inflate the tension. This is unnecessary since there’s already a ton of tension in the story on account of, you know, the war! Not to mention, the monster is foolish. No, I don’t mean it's a dumb creature; I mean everything about it is utterly stupid! It looks like a giant Bat but doesn’t seem to have wings, as evidenced by it crawling all around the Plane like a Spider, so you think it’s an earthbound monster, only for it to suddenly reveal its wings hidden under its arms when Maude tries to force it off the plane. Prompting you to ask yourself why was it clinging to the Plane for dear life if it can fly!? It makes no sense and reeks of a massive case of writer's convenience.
While all of the terrible aspects of this film overshadow any good graces it might have otherwise had, there were, at least, a few things about the movie I did like.
As I mentioned earlier, Chloe Grace Moretz is a talented actress, and she carries the movie on her shoulders as well as she can, despite the terrible material she has to work with. At least a few lines of the dialogue were genuinely bad-ass, and I liked how the whole film was going for a homage to cheesy exploitation schlock from the 70s and 80s with its synthesizer music score and grainy cinematography. All of these good elements deserve to be in a better movie.
Shadow in the Cloud is an absolute mess! It’s filled to the brim with wrong-headed creative choices, overly repetitive scenes, and no real reason to care. Not to mention awful special-effects that show how hard they tried and failed to stretch their budget. If you want to watch a good WW2 movie with a supernatural twist, go watch Overlord instead. At least that movie provides the visceral satisfaction of watching Nazis getting their butts whipped.
Skip this one.
Ladies & gentlemen, I am TheNorm; thank you all for reading.
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