This is a review on wrote on my website: www.TheCoreJunction.com
I was lucky enough to have an opportunity to see a free, advance screening of Universal's highly-anticipated film The Fourth Kind at Columbia University's Alfred Lerner Hall on October 29, 2009. The Core Junction is proud to bring you this review, a week before the film's November 6 theatrical release.
It seems that horror and thriller movies have entered a new era. The long-lived genre of grisly and sadistic horror—marked by Lionsgate's Saw franchise over the last decade—is gradually being pushed aside by films that appeal to a different fear factor. The Fourth Kind falls into this up-and-coming genre of horror/thriller movies that tap a visceral core of human cognition and trepidation. Beginning with the 1999 sensation The Blair With Project, more and more films are choosing to cut back on gratuitous gore and violence and take a more original approach to scare audiences. The 2008 blockbuster Cloverfield and, most recently, Oren Peli's Paranormal Activity, are also founding fathers of this "genre". While The Fourth Kind ultimately isn't as successful as its predecessors, it takes an original approach on an audacious premise of alien abduction.
The Fourth Kind begins with an introduction by lead actress and former Resident Evil star Milla Jovovich, who dramatizes psychiatrist Dr. Abigail Tyler in the film. Jovovich explains that every scene is supported by real archive footage but, in the end, it is up to the audience to decide whether or not what they are seeing is real. She also says that real names of people have been changed for privacy purposes. Jovovich then closes her remarks stating, "Some of what you are about to see is extremely disturbing." To some extent, she is right.
An interview conducted by director Olatunde Osunsanmi with Dr. Tyler is woven into the movie intermittently as she recounts her experiences with alien encounters and abductions. Set in the small town of Nome, Alaska, located on the state's southern Seward Pneinsula, the movie picks up with Dr. Tyler doing case studies on individuals who suffer from abnormal sleep problems. These patients all have one main thing in common: waking up in the middle of the night to an owl looking at them. Archive footage is cautiously integrated whenever possible, albeit often for only a few seconds of dialogue. All-the-while filming each session, Dr. Tyler begins to induce her patients into hypnosis to unlock otherwise vague memories from the nights they wake up to the owl. The yielded results are usually disturbing, egregious reactions by the hypnotized patients. From here, the plot unravels into the personal development of Dr. Tyler and a few of her patients.
In terms of production, The Fourth Kind is rather sloppily assembled. It seems like almost every scene includes overly detailed text explaining who each character is and what the audience is either hearing or seeing (e.g., "Actual audio, Dr. Tyler dictation, etc.). While sometimes necessary, the excessive use of this text forces the audience to constantly be snapped back into reality, and usually not in a manner beneficial to the film's cogency. Furthermore, while used cautiously, the actual utilization of archive audio and video often awkwardly overlaps the acted-out scenes.
The acting in the film also detracts from the overall experience. Hollywood commonly "sexualizes" real-life people, but this is ineffective when the delirious-looking, pallid, and emaciated Dr. Tyler is played by the beautiful Milla Jovovich. This is especially inopportune when scenes of the real Dr. Tyler and Jovovich are literally placed next to one another on screen. This flaw, however, is not Jovovich's fault, but other actors are culpable for deficient acting. Canadian-born Will Patton, who plays Nome's sheriff, over-dramatizes nearly every line he is scripted, producing laughable moments during otherwise tense scenes.
Despite some blemishes, the movie does have some genuinely disturbing, frightening scenes that transcend contemplation over what is or is not real. Whether you are skeptical about extra terrestrials or not, some shocking footage is guaranteed to get your adrenaline flowing. But of course, the notion of what or real or not crescendos the entire film. The audience is constantly forced to challenge what they believe and, while easy to make excuses for some of the alleged "evidence", there are certainly some aspects that will be difficult for skeptics to explain without extensive research.
Whether you look at it from a cynical standpoint or as someone who simply enjoys movies, The Fourth Kind is far from perfect. Regardless of its shortcomings, it's successful at delivering some terrifying moments and is guaranteed to make you think. It certainly is emblematic of a still young and fresh genre of horror and thriller movies that gear towards natural instincts rather than superfluous blood spilling.
