The Fourth Kind
Universal Pictures | Release Date: November 6, 2009 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
34
METASCORE
Generally unfavorable reviews based on 27 Critic Reviews
Positive:
2
Mixed:
16
Negative:
9
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
75
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Rick Groen
In truth, what follows is less disturbing than intriguing – to audiences hip to the mechanics of horror flicks, it's rare fun to be fooled, and this one is pretty damned clever. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia Puig
You don't have to believe in far-fetched tales of mysterious beams of light and alien abductions to get caught up in The Fourth Kind. Read full review
50
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
Too often, The Fourth Kind makes the paranormal look disappointingly normal. Read full review
50
St. Louis Post-DispatchJoe Williams
Technically proficient enough to keep us intrigued; but we shouldn't have to Google a movie to know if we were scared. Read full review
50
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
A mildly scary, totally meaningless excursion into the realms of psychological horror and alien-abduction conspiracies. Read full review
50
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
The result is not entirely uninteresting, but it suffers from some ill-advised decisions. In fact, the film's "hook" may be its greatest detraction. Read full review
50
Miami HeraldConnie Ogle
While there are some genuinely creepy moments, it never truly ends up as more than an average "X-Files" episode. Read full review
50
Portland OregonianM. E. Russell
Sporadically clever and chilling. Read full review
50
New York PostKyle Smith
The Fourth Kind has a clever gimmick and nothing more. Read full review
42
The A.V. ClubScott Tobias
Terminally awkward in the way it meshes fake real footage with faker fake footage. It isn’t required to be convincing as fact, but it doesn’t convince as fiction, either. Read full review
40
Village VoiceScott Foundas
A couple of modestly effective shocks lie in store. Read full review
40
The Hollywood ReporterMichael Rechtshaffen
Combines purported raw case study footage with dramatic "recreations" to unsuccessful effect. Read full review
40
VarietyRob Nelson
Even the most gullible auds will be challenged to buy into the picture, billed as "based on the actual case studies" and, in any case, rendered rather boring by writer-director Olatunde Osunsanmi ("The Cavern"). Read full review
40
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
This is a strange movie (it feels like a lost episode of the old Leonard Nimoy chestnut In Search of …) about strange people doing strange things. Read full review
40
The New York TimesStephen Holden
May be humorless, paranoid nonsense, but its biggest failure is its inability to scare. Read full review
40
Film ThreatMatthew Sorrento
The Fourth Kind has nowhere to go and sticks to its real-life/reel-life device. It feels like mud by the second act. Read full review
40
Time OutJoshua Rothkopf
Unfortunately, none of the subsequent noise is all that scary, and the striving for "Paranormal Activity’s" buzz is shameless. Read full review
40
TimeRichard Corliss
Osunsanmi wants you to believe that everything he shows you that's not reenacted by professionals really happened, and is documented by the omnipresent video cameras. It's a device used far more successfully in "Paranormal Activity," which had the added benefit of being a good movie. Read full review
39
NPRIan Buckwalter
When he divides the screen into quadrants for his big finish, the effect is just laughable -- but then by that point, the movie is too. Read full review
38
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
The Fourth Kind is a pseudo-documentary like "Paranormal Activity" and "The Blair Witch Project." But unlike those two, which just forge ahead with their home video cameras, this one encumbers its flow with ceaseless reminders that it is a dramatization of real events. Read full review
30
Chicago ReaderCliff Doerksen
Osunsanmi's big formal innovation tunrs out to be the split-screen pairing of patently bogus "archival" black-and-white video that shows alleged abductees undergoing hypnosis and color "reenactments" of same. Ultimately it's up to you, the viewer, to decide which is more boring. Read full review
30
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
Mr. Osunsanmi's chutzpah exceeds his skill. Read full review
30
Los Angeles TimesRobert Abele
They try to get 'real' about strange occurrences. Instead they get ludicrous. Read full review
25
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
The Fourth Kind doesn’t build, instill, or maintain an audience’s fear. It just spends 98 minutes trying to prove that what you’re watching actually happened. Read full review
25
San Francisco ChronicleAmy Biancolli
As it stands,The Fourth Kind boasts a creepy kind of joke - and a confusing kind of horror. Read full review
25
Washington PostMichael O'Sullivan
But seriously, folks, if you're going to make a scary movie, shouldn't you be able to do it without resorting to both "Blair Witch"-style found footage and movie stars? (Will Patton and Elias Koteas also show up as, respectively, an angry sheriff and a psychologist friend of Abbey's.) Read full review
0
New York Daily NewsJoe Neumaier
By the end of its way-too-long 98 minutes, there are four things audiences will be haunted by: Jovovich's annoying, whispery monotone; silly closeups of owls; Will Patton's Z-movie turn as a grizzled sheriff, and dialogue like "It's too late to forget what you already know." Ain't that the truth. Read full review
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