Shadow in the Cloud (2020)

Movie Info

Worst in-flight entertainment

The Fool’s Errand has an unexpected mission.  Maude Garrett (Chloë Grace Moretz) has boarded right before takeoff with a top secret package of upmost importance that needs to be flown from New Zealand to Samoa to help the war effort.  When Maude becomes trapped in the turret, she not only sees that Japanese Zeroes have spotted the plane, but something else has boarded.  Maude must get her package to Samoa, but the crew of the Fool’s Errand is going to learn they have taken on more than they expected.

Directed by Roseanne Liang (who cowrote the script with Max Landis), Shadow in the Cloud is a World War II horror action film.  Premiering at the Toronto International Film Festival, the movie was released on streaming on January 1, 2021 to mostly positive results.

Genre horror is a weird niche and movies like Overlord have realized it is largely untapped in comparison to straight horror.  Shadow in the Cloud is not only a horror movie, but an action movie that provides a fun ride, but enjoying it means giving up any realism you hope the film will have.  Due to aspects of the plot, a ******spoiler alert****** is in effect for the rest of the review.

For as much as the mom tries to save her kid, I give this critter points for persistence….it wants that baby

The movie is crazy.  It has dogfights and gunfights…and a gremlin.  All of this is done while the main character is holding onto a large shoulder bag that has a baby inside.  You get the character hanging from the bottom of a plane to rescue her baby and even being blow-up back into the plane from an exploding Japanese warplane.  The movie ends with an upside down maneuver and a crash landing that everyone (alive) walks away from.  It isn’t realistic, but it is fun.

The movie also is a feminist piece.  The men who are jerks, die, and those who aren’t jerks live.  Chloë Grace Moretz plays the ultimate war “bad-ass” that would give Ripley from the Alien franchise a run for the money.  While the others are complaining, she’s gunning down Japanese, physically fighting a giant rat with wings, and landing a plane…all finished with nursing her child.  As mentioned, it isn’t realistic, but it is fun…and almost a commentary on what is accepted as “realistic” action when men do similar stunts.

It’s kind of like the end of The Matrix…big battle in a mud puddle

The movie sometimes looks very good and sometimes not good at all.  It feels like a lot of the money of the movie went into the gremlin and the effects surrounding it.  It is a fun creature feature in that sense, but the look of the plane battles is about as realistic as the plot.

Shadow in the Cloud is a rollercoaster type movie.  I was able to escape into it despite suspending belief, and I liked the mash-up of genres.  If you watched Shadow in the Cloud and bemoan it the whole time, you won’t have fun (but I also couldn’t blame you).  It is a movie that has to hit just right.  It has been interesting to see Chloë Grace Moretz grow-up on screen, and I am curious where she’ll go next.