The Super Network

3/5

In a small town in Alaska, strange events have been happening. Going between ‘real footage’ and re-enactments, the mystery explored, to try and explain what happened and how it affected those involved. That is The Fourth Kind in a nut shell. The advertisements for this film, say this is all true, based on a true story using actual footage from the real events. They really push it as being real, the film even starts off with its star Milla Jovovich saying she is playing the part of Abbey Tyler and the footage used is the actual footage. However this is all not true, the footage is not real, and this is a work of fiction.

I really do not think this will spoil the film for you, you are better off knowing this is not true, because if you think it is through the entire film and look it up and find out it wasn’t, you will be disappointed. From the get go, it did not feel real to me. The ‘actual footage’ while it looks authentic enough, and the actress playing Abbey was convincing, it did not make sense that real names would be changed but their faces not blurred out. The ‘actual footage’ part of it was well done though, it is rather creepy at times, and I liked the way they played that out. It does take time to get used to the ‘actual footage’ getting shown with the ‘re-enactment’ footage. After around 15 minutes or so, you get used to it and it flowed just fine for me. It ended up meshing quite well, and I thought they had a good idea with it and ran with it well.

Performance wise, I thought it was a rather strong showing from Milla Jovovich, she was convincing and sympathetic as Abbey. I really liked her a lot and I thought this was one of her strong roles, very much a reason why I didn’t mind this film. Elias Koteas can do no wrong in my eyes, I adore him and I thought he was good here as well as Abel, friend and Doctor. He was the skeptic, until he see’s certain things and he doesn’t know how to feel. Hakeem Kae-Kazim was good as well, I liked the addition of his character to the story as Odusami, a man who can help with somethings. I felt Will Patton just over acted like there was no tomorrow as the Sheriff and he really was not convincing at all. The actors playing the patients in both the ‘re-enactments’ and ‘actual footage’ were all pretty solid and sold it well.

Where I think this fell short was the whole this is true, this is true stuff, they really shove it down your throat and it is really just not necessary at all. I mean I understand the idea behind it, but we get the drift. The story itself almost felt as if by the end, it had not really gotten anywhere. I was into the story of strange things happening, the hint of alien involvement (hardly a spoiler since the title is the Fourth Kind which means alien contact) and abductions of these folk and what things were they doing, to have such an affect on the people. It is actually a sad story, especially for Abbey and you do feel for her quite a lot. But I felt it didn’t really go anywhere new as far as the story, and I wanted a bit more out of it. I didn’t mind this film but I have a hard time recommending it though. I will say that it did have some good creepy moments, and I liked how they didn’t show too much as well. Sometimes what you don’t see is far more scarier, and I felt that worked to their advantage.