Story Recapped here. Today I'm going to explain a science fiction psychological thriller film called 10 Cloverfield Lane. Spoilers ahead!
Watch out and take care. In New Orleans, a fashion designer named Michelle frantically packs a suitcase. She heads out, leaving her keys and a diamond ring behind.
She drives out of the city, plagued with troubles in her mind. While filling up her car at a gas station that evening, Michelle sees a suspicious truck park behind her car. She ignores it and continues her journey.
Back on the road, she receives a call from Ben, her ex-fiance. Ben begs for her to come back, but Michelle refuses to speak. The couple had a fight which caused Michelle to leave abruptly.
Tired of his pleading, Michelle ends the call and turns the radio on. The news reports a power surge that caused a widespread blackout in the city. Ben calls her again, but something crashes onto her car before she can answer, causing it to flip off the road.
Michelle wakes up in a nondescript concrete room, seeing her leg injured and chained to the wall. The power hums, waning in and out. Michelle tries to pry the shackles off, but it's no use.
Michelle weeps, confused and terrified. Not wanting to be a victim, she grabs the IV pole and uses it to grab her phone from the opposite corner of the room. She's successful only to find her phone has no service.
Heavy footsteps sound from the other side of the wall. Michelle covers herself with a blanket, awaiting her captor. A large man enters, carrying a plate of food and a gun on his belt.
Michelle begs for her life, but the man doesn't acknowledge her. Instead, he fixes her IV bag. The man, Howard, claims that he simply intends to keep her alive.
He gives her a set of crutches, telling her to practice walking with them. Michelle bluffs, telling him that her fiance will call the cops. Howard confidently tells her that no one is looking for her before tossing her the key to the chains.
As soon as he's out, Michelle frees herself and puts on clothes. She tries to open the door, but it's locked. Determined to escape, she uses the key to file a sharp end on her crutch.
She opens the vent in her room and lights her shirt on fire, producing enough smoke to trigger the fire alarm and force Howard to return. Ready to fight, she waits by the door and ambushes him. But Howard grabs her and injects a sedative on her arm.
Michelle wakes up in the same room, food waiting for her. Howard admires her spunk but says that she should be thankful that he found her. Michelle begs for her freedom again, but Howard tells her there's nowhere else to go.
Howard recounts saving her from the car crash. He explains that a potential nuclear attack happened, but they're safe in his bunker. Hoping to get on his good side, Michelle thanks him but suggests that she needs a hospital.
This frustrates Howard, claiming that the air outside is contaminated, and it could be a few years before it's safe to go out. Michelle wants to call her family, but Howard is sure that everyone outside is dead. A noise from outside informs Michelle that there's someone else with them in the bunker.
Howard locks her in the room again before dealing with the other person. Hours later, Michelle wakes up to find the door is finally open. She walks out and sees a hallway full of supplies.
There, she meets the other resident, Emmett, whose arm is injured. Michelle brings up trying to escape with him, but Emmett is also convinced that the air outside is contaminated. Howard finds them, telling Michelle that the sound earlier was Emmett knocking down a week's worth of food.
Howard gives them a tour of the common area stocked with DVDs, books, and other entertainment media. Howard lays down some rules, including the no-touch rule. He shows Michelle his private room, where the only bathroom in the bunker is, asking her to take a shower.
Despite Michelle's insistence on privacy, Howard decides to keep watch by the door, as he doesn't trust her yet. While preparing a meal, Howard mentions Megan but only says that she's not with them any longer. When the power fluctuates, Michelle suggests that it's caused by a car above them.
Howard insists that there is no one above them. Seeing that Michelle still doubts him, he takes her to the exit with a window to the outside world. There, Michelle sees his decaying pigs, whom Howard claims have died due to the poisoned air.
Michelle turns her eyes across the field, seeing Howard's truck. Her mind plays the moments before the crash, sure that this was the same truck that ran her off the road. Michelle's suspicions towards Howard grow.
Emmet gives Michelle information about Howard. Howard worked on satellites for the military before moving to the farm, where Emmett helped Howard build the bunker. Michelle shares her theory that Howard purposefully crashed her car to kidnap her, but Emmett doesn't believe this.
The day he came into the bunker, Emmett saw the explosion. Knowing that Howard's theories about the apocalypse were coming true, Emmett fought his way into the bunker to survive, injuring his arm in the process. Michelle insists that she heard a car above the bunker earlier, but Howard interrupts her and invites them to dinner.
Michelle is uneasy at the dining table, wondering if Howard heard what she said. Emmett tries to start a casual conversation with the other two. This helps Michelle lighten up, much to Howard's frustration.
Emmett's jovial mood angers Howard, but he pushes this down, simply telling Emmett that he'd rather eat in peace. Watching how Howard is easily annoyed, Michelle formulates an idea. She focuses her attention on Emmett, seemingly flirting with him.
Howard is visibly jealous and enraged. When he sees Michelle touch Emmett's hand, he slams the table and corners Michelle, accusing her of insulting him. Emmett tries to calm him down but is also afraid of him.
After they're seated down, Michelle hides keys in her hands under the table, having taken them from Howard. The sound of a car overhead catches all of their attention. Seeing an opportunity, Michelle grabs a bottle and slams it across Howard's face.
She climbs up the table and to the bunker's exit. Her hands shake as she unlocks the door. Howard clambers up the steps, barely reaching her before she opens the first door and closing it behind her.
She starts opening the second door but spots a car in front. Hope fills Michelle. She starts calling for help while still struggling with the locks on the door.
Suddenly, a woman covered with lesions crashes against the door, begging Michelle to let her in. Howard orders Michelle not to let her in. Finally realizing that Howard may be telling the truth, Michelle stops unlocking the door and asks Howard if they can help the woman.
The woman starts banging her head on the door. The frightened Michelle backs away. After the event, Michelle is kept in the concrete room again.
Howard confesses that he crashed her car, but it was an accident. He knew the attack was coming after hearing the news. He drove in a panic to get back to his bunker, and it caused him to crash her car.
He offers her a set of Megan's old clothes to clean up. After showering, Howard tells her that the woman outside was a neighbor, Leslie, who could've heard about his bunker. He then has Michelle stitch up the wound she caused on his face.
After giving Michelle her belongings from her car, Howard finally opens up about his estranged daughter, Megan, who was taken to Chicago by her mother. Later, Emmett tells Michelle how he competed in track competitions, which got him accepted to Louisiana Tech University. But he got scared about failing and didn't go.
This prompts Michelle to share how she was always protected by her brother when their father got mad. But when she had a chance to help another girl with an enraged father, Michelle still got scared and ran. She regrets her actions, but Emmett promises her that their lives can still mean something since they're still alive.
Over the next few days, the trio adjusted to life underground, enjoying each other's camaraderie. One day, the bunker shakes, and they hear helicopters flying overhead as the power flickers. Howard figures that even if it's the military, it might be the enemy sweeping the ground for survivors.
An alarm sounds. Their air filtration system is blocked. Michelle is assigned to climb into the vents and restart the air filtration system.
Inside the cramped space, Michelle struggles but eventually reaches the mechanical room. She restarts the system as Howard instructed and is relieved to hear it running again. Then, she sees a ladder leading up to a hatch to the outside.
On the window, she finds scratches that spell HELP. At the bottom of the ladder, Michelle picks up a familiar-looking earring. While they're alone, Michelle shows Emmett the earrings that looked like they had blood on them.
Then she shows Megan's photo wearing the same earring. But Emmett recognizes the girl in the photo as Brittany, who went to high school with his sister and went missing two years ago. Michelle tells him about the word HELP scratched from the inside of the room.
Another photo slips out of Howard's book, one of Brittany and Howard sitting together. Brittany's shirt is the same one that Michelle is wearing. Emmett plots to take Howard captive and get him to confess what he did to Brittany.
Michelle questions who Howard can confess to, as there's nobody else but them. Howard interrupts them and tells Michelle to shower. While preparing her shower, Michelle stares at the shower curtain, formulating a plan.
She shows Emmett a drawing she did on a magazine, convincing him to follow along. Later that night, Emmett grabs a pair of scissors from the kitchen. Then, he convinces Howard that Michelle may have contaminated his bathroom when she took a shower after fixing the air filtration system.
As a precaution, Howard disposes of the shower curtain, but Michelle secretly retrieves it. Using various materials in the bunker, Michelle makes a hazmat suit so that one of them could go outside and look for help. While playing a board game, Emmett becomes flustered, making Howard suspicious.
Later that day, Michelle continues to work on the hazmat suit when Howard arrives, barely giving her time to hide everything. Michelle, Howard, and Emmet transfer a barrel from the kitchen to Howard's room. Howard explains that the acid inside can dissolve most biological material, including humans.
Howard starts interrogating them about his tools, threatening to dissolve them into the acid. Hoping to calm him down, Emmett lies that he took the tools to make a weapon, and Michelle had nothing to do with it. He tells Howard that he wanted Michelle to respect him the way she respects Howard.
He apologizes, and Howard accepts it, then shoots Emmett in the face. Michelle cowers in fear, with Howard holding her, telling her that Emmett would have hurt her. He asks her to go to her room while he disposes of Emmett's body.
Alone, Michelle mourns for Emmett, looking at the ID from his wallet. Howard walks in, and she sees that he had cleaned up and shaved. He leaves her a bowl of ice cream.
Michelle finds the bus ticket that Emmett was supposed to use to go to the university. Not wanting Emmett to have died in vain, Michelle decides to go through with the plan alone. She continues making the hazmat suit before Howard calls her for dinner.
She hides the make-shift gas mask in the vent just before Howard walks in. But a screw on the vent falls. He checks on it and asks her why it's loose.
Then, he spots a part of the suit under her mattress. Furious, he drags her off the mattress and reveals the suit underneath. Michelle locks the door with Howard still inside.
She searches Howard's room and takes a chemical coolant. Howard stops her, but she kicks the barrel of acid towards him, causing him to tumble down, gurgling in pain. Michelle climbs over him and escapes.
The acid causes a fire in the living room, setting off the alarm. Michelle gathers the hazmat suit and mask from her room. Howard staggers towards her, his body half-burnt.
She brings down a shelf to stop him, climbing over it to escape. The fire blocks her way to the bunker's exit. Michelle climbs into the vent, hoping to escape through the mechanical room hatch instead.
Howard hears her crawling inside the vent and starts stabbing a knife into it. He grabs Michelle by the ankle, but she kicks her legs until he releases her. In the mechanical room, Michelle hurriedly puts on the hazmat suit, using duct tape to seal every seam.
She climbs to the hatch and freezes the padlock with the chemical coolant. After numerous attempts, she breaks it and opens the hatch. Finally above ground, Michelle breathes heavily, looking around for any sign of life.
She sees Howard's old truck and gets inside but rips a tear in her suit. Fearing contamination, she seals it with duct tape. Once fixed, Michelle hears a flock of birds flying overhead.
She watches them, realizing that the birds should have died if the air was poisoned. Taking the risk, she removes her mask, waiting for the worst. But nothing happens.
Relieved, Michelle chuckles. A rumbling from afar catches her attention. She climbs on top of the truck and sees an aircraft.
Something moves from inside the nearby shed. Thinking that it's Howard, Michelle hides behind the truck. Instead, the bunker explodes.
Michelle watches the aircraft turn, alerted by the explosion. As it gets nearer, it dawns on her that the aircraft is an alien. Michelle gets back in the truck, searching for the key.
When she can't find it, she goes to Leslie's car but triggers its alarm. Michelle rushes to the shed to hide, seeing Leslie's body inside. She checks outside and sees a creature coming out of the field.
Michelle searches Leslie's body for the keys, but the creature peers into the shed. Michelle finally takes the keys and shuts the alarm off, diverting the alien's attention back to it. Michelle crawls out of the shed and runs to the house nearby.
The creature hears her and gives chase. Both Michelle and the alien stop when a rumbling comes from the house. Behind the house, the alien aircraft looms over.
Seeing it release gas, Michelle retrieves her mask and frantically seals it on. The gas causes another explosion just before it passes. Michelle gets up, alerting the creature to attack.
She gets inside the truck but fails to close it. The creature opens its mouth, grabbing hold of her mask, before pulling away with its prize. Michelle closes the truck, but the truck is pulled into the air by the alien aircraft.
Seeing the large being above her, Michelle sinks, losing hope. Beside her, she finds a lighter, giving her an idea. She grabs the liquor rolling on the floor and creates a Molotov cocktail.
When the creature opens its mouth, Michelle throws the explosive inside. The alien explodes and drops the truck. The alien aircraft crashes and burns on the field.
Michelle wakes up and gets out of the truck. She takes time to catch her breath, finally having time to let the situation sink in. She spots Leslie's car, undamaged.
She gets inside, thankful that the car still works. Michelle drives off, knocking down the mailbox that bears the address, "10 Cloverfield. " The car radio picks up a transmission.
The broadcast directs survivors to go to Baton Rouge. It also requests help from people with medical and combat experience, asking them to help survivors in Houston. Michelle finds herself at the crossroads between Baton Rouge and Houston, thinking of which path she'll take.
She heads to Houston to help the survivors fight.
