Monday, June 6, 2011

Movie review: The fourth kind


When you shake hands with an alien, it's called an "enounter of the third kind.
When you're in an alien spaceship with technical devices in your rectum that are not from this planet, it's called a fourth kind encounter. This 2009 movie concentrates on abductions in a small town in Alaska - over the past 40 years, there have been several mysterious disappearances.
The Fourth Kind evolves around psychologist Dr. Abigail Tyler, who faces these issues as more and more people turn up to tell her stories about involuntary contact with extra-terrestrials. As if that wasn't enough, there's also rumors about a government cover up - what more could you want?
Pictured above: An alien Dr. Abigail Tyler



The basic plot does have potential, what ruins it is how the story is told in terms of style and acting.
The film tries to constantly remind you that everything shown in it is completely real while, in fact, none of it is. It even starts with Milla Jovovich in a close-up shot telling you the whole movie is not just based on real events, it even contains real footage...didn't we see the exact same thing in the movie trailer already?
This means the producers cut in scenes that have been filmed with handycams - they show people screaming, people crying...but in the end you realize even those "real" scenes are as fake as they can get; so why use them in the first place? There's no need for sudden splitscreens of recreated footage on one side and real more recreated footage on the other.
So apart from the real versus fake issues, the film offers some scary scenes, most of which you have seen in the trailer already. While this movie doesn't shove CGI aliens into your face (and I think that's a good thing), some other scenes that could have used special effects are outright messed up with cheap tricks. Whenever something exciting is supposed to be happening on-screen, a "VHS-like" blur is shown.
What you get are two movies combined into one, neither of which is able to actually shock or surprise you.
In conclusion, the fact that they emphasize so much on making it look real gives this film a clumsy fake look. What I did like was that the aliens are represented by owls that people witness around the town - it's a clever analogy because of their dark, oval-shaped eyes and creepy stare. The owls are also pretty much the only thing you'll remember of this movie when, after 98 minutes of people screaming it's not an owl! you finally get to see the credits.
Sure looks like an owl to me

7 comments:

  1. So...ill take that as i shouldnt watch this movie?

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  2. At least it doesn't do it for me - from my point of view, it's a rather uninteresting horror flick/ thriller.

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  3. the first time watching it (helps when you are baked and the room is dark) I thought it was a little freaky but obviously fake. Watching it again, I found it uninteresting. It's a kind of fun to watch with people who scare easy and just laugh at all the bits like where the girl is levitating.

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  4. Wow you made me order this DVD.
    Great review good sir!

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  5. I didn't like this movie at all, Iwas pretty disappointed with it actually. ;(

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  6. Watched this movie, and didn't really enjoy it. No part of it seemed realistic, as they want you to believe, nor did it present any scary moments within the movie.

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  7. Watched this movie, its actually pretty good, I would recommend if you have some time.

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