The Fourth Kind

There are Alien movies and Alien movies. The Fourth Kind is the latter.

This is a movie which needs to be watched without referring to the IMDB summary and if does so, it does pack a pleasant surprise. Obviously it is not up there with the alien classics by James Cameron or Spielberg or even Ridley Scott because if it were, one would have already watched this movie or atleast heard of it. But nonetheless, it is a riveting thriller, adequately paced and leaves in its wake a brooding mind in the viewer.

The movie is interspersed every now and then with supposedly real audio and video clippings of the happenings which lend an eerie chill to the plot but also disturb the pace more than once. The narrative itself is pretty good and doesn't fail to intrigue the viewer right from the beginning, building up the element of suspense quite well. While one is indeed left with a feeling that an abler director could have taken the movie to a higher level, it does not hinder the mood of the film in any way. In fact, the director did a good job in not trying to take a firm stand for or against the belief that is the persona of the movie. He just presents the happenings in an objective way and that's about it. This movie is definitely not to convince the viewer to believe.

As a thriller, The Fourth Kind has ample moments that do their best to shock the viewer, and it does so not by showing insane amounts of blood and violence but via simple but powerful visuals of individuals' experiences of the fourth kind. If only a glimpse of the aliens was shown, the kid inside everyone would have been satisfied! There are no shoddy CG effects and the acting is good. For what the movie was supposed to be, it does a fine job and nothing more.