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Movie Review: The Fourth Kind
This is a movie review of the film "The Fourth Kind". “The Fourth Kind” is the latest in a string of “alien abduction” movies that really began back in the 1950’s. The title is both an homage to “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” and a way to differentiate the style of the film from other films of this type including “Fire in the Sky” and “X-Files”.
We’ll get to the movie in a minute, but first we should discuss the style. Lately, there have been many movies starting with the “Blair Witch Project” and culminating with “Paranormal Activity” that use a mix between handheld documentary style and the usual cinematographic style. “The Fourth Kind” takes it a step further in that many scenes in the movie are in split screen with the dramatic part played on one part of the screen and the documentary film on the other. In general, this style works for most scenes. However, this style also distracts in many ways from the usual outstanding performance we expect from the main character as played by Mila Jovovich.
The premise of the movie is simple. The movie asserts that Nome, Alaska has more unsolved disappearances than any other town in the United States. Due to this Nome has been visited more times by the FBI than any other town in Alaska, although the FBI never makes an appearance in the film. Dr. Abigail Tyler, as played by Mila Jovovich, is continuing the work of her late husband which is looking into these disappearances. As she does she finds that there is more to it than people just disappearing.
Dr. Tyler uses a now controversial technique to get to the root cause of why people are having difficulty sleeping. She uses a form of hypnotherapy called “regression” to have people relive the events at night that wake them up. She notices a pattern in the events and a commonality between her patients. They report seeing a large grey owl staring at them through the window. As they try to remember what actually happened to them during this period of time she comes across a mental block that either keeps the people from remembering the event or that drives them insane with fear. During the process one of her patients commits suicide after killing his whole family. This brings her to the attention of the local sheriff, August, as played by the exceptional Will Patton. There is supposed to be tension between the two relating to Abigail’s husband’s death, but it never comes off as real. As the story progresses odder activity occurs including a recording of a voice in Abigail’s room that is not hers. This voice is speaking a language that is not recognized by Dr. Tyler so she calls in a specialist who translates the voice. He tells her that voice is speaking Sumerian which hasn’t been spoken by a human in over 5,000 years. Events cumulate after Abigail’s daughter is abducted and she attempts to communicate with the alien presence.
There are so many things wrong with this movie it’s hard to know where to start. Firstly, the setting of the movie is completely wrong. Nome, Alaska is situated on a relatively flat peninsula that has few trees. However, in the movie, not only are there towering mountains on all sides of the town, the whole town appears to be built in a mixed forest of conifers and deciduous trees. Also, it rains through most of the movie. Nome gets about 17 inches of precipitation per year, but if the movie is to be believed they get most of that in a two to three week period, all of it as rain. So, the setting is hokey and unbelievable. Secondly, the actors are used poorly in the movie. Ms. Jovovich is, as always, outstanding and Will Patton adds something to any movie he’s in, but the tension between the two is forced and rigid. The action is confined by the faux documentary style. Thirdly, the movie is supposed to frighten us, which is does not. Through the entire dreary 98 minutes of run time there is only one scene that actually made me jump and I jump pretty easily.
In conclusion, this isn’t a movie to watch in the theater. Heck, it isn’t even a movie to watch at home unless you don’t have any thing else to do. And by anything, I mean cleaning the cat box and the drain trap are preferable to sitting through this movie. They should show it at the dentist’s office, because getting one’s teeth drilled without pain killer would be less painful than spending $10 on this movie. But, hey, that’s just one guy’s opinion. Have fun and keep watching!!!
