Cloverfield

This Bad Robot production marked the return of found-footage films, a trend which continues to this day. Unlike other entries in the genre, however, this ambitious film experimented with the format, using the idea of re-recordable tape as a means of plot development – characterization literally bled through the story. Featuring one of the most infamous viral marketing campaigns of the 2000s—with the film being known only as 1-18-08 up until months before the release, marking the true realization of J.J. Abrams' "mystery box" philosophy—Cloverfield took the unique route of using pre-release multimedia to flesh out its story.