Shadow in the Cloud

If you enjoy reading my Spoiler-Free reviews, please follow my blog @ https://www.msbreviews.com I consider Chloë Grace Moretz (Greta) one of the best actresses of her generation. I would be pretty surprised if she doesn't get at least an Oscar nomination in the next ten years. While it's true that her choices don't always end up being good movies, she's rarely the one to blame when things don't work out. In Roseanne Liang's film, she's undoubtedly the glue that holds everything together. Moretz perfectly handles what it's close to being a solo movie - she's literally stuck inside a tiny turret - demonstrating extraordinary emotional range. For most of the runtime, the viewers are placed inside a claustrophobic place, watching the protagonist communicate through radio with the other crew members, who so happen to be extremely sexist, annoying male characters. While I do understand the intent behind this character archetype, it becomes so on the nose that it almost makes the director and her co-writer, Max Landis, the ones who seemingly never met any other type of army men. The narrative holds so many distinct ideas that go from a monster flick to a war drama, and their balance is all over the place, just like the score (Mahuia Bridgman-Cooper). Once the mystery surrounding her package is revealed, and the action sequences start taking the front stage, the story takes a huge leap into the utterly absurd. From one of the most shockingly hilarious uses of an airplane explosion to the unbelievability of everything that happens in the third act, it isn't easy to shut down my brain when the film until that point was going more for the grounded depiction of how it is to be an isolated woman in the Air Force than a straight-up sci-fi/monster/action flick. Despite all that, I can't deny its entertainment value and the exceptional lead performance. Rating: B-