The Fourth Kind is a sci-fi thriller starring Milla Jovovich, The title refers to the four "kinds" of alien contact. The first kind is a UFO sighting, the second kind is observation of a physical result (like a crop circle or radiation), the third kind is contact, and the fourth kind is abduction. Jovovich plays a Hollywood version of "real life" psychologist Dr. Abby Tyler. The movie shows both "real" footage from wireless cctv cameras, as well as a "Hollywood" version with actors in the roles of the participants. According to Dr. Tyler, her husband was mysteriously murdered. As she takes over his life's work, she finds that the people of Nome, Alaska have been unknowingly abducted every night by 'non-human intelligence.' Through hypnosis and therapy, she tries to get to the bottom of what is going on in this small town.

I was skeptical about the validity of the "real life" portions of the movie. Hey, I remember when The Blair Witch Project pulled the wool over my eyes. I wasn't about to let it happen again. Needless to say, the movie is entirely fiction. There is no real life Dr. Abby Taylor and the movie wasn't even shot in Nome. (It was shot in Bulgaria because it's prettier than Nome.) Since the movie pretty much revolves around you believing that this stuff really happened to people (the movie starts off with Jovovich speaking to us out of character about how this is a dramatization of real life events and that real life video and audio recordings will be shown), it's difficult to get invested in the characters. I spent a good portion of the movie waiting for the big death scene. In case you didn't know, the movie is rated PG-13...there isn't a whole lot of really scary things that happen. It's mostly sudden screams and things like that. I think that the movie might have been better if they went for the R rating and added a bit more blood. Not necessarily exploding head type things, but maybe some severe nosebleeds or bleeding from the ears.

If you can suspend your belief for awhile, it's not really a terrible movie. There's some interesting side-by-side video comparing the "real" footage to the "Hollywood' footage. Granted, it would have been better if the grainy footage was actually real footage instead of video that was separately shot by different actors. Overall, I just found it bland and uninteresting.

For those Doctor Who fans in the United States, last night was the premiere of The Sarah Jane Adventures on the SciFi channel. People who have watched the original series of Doctor Who know Sarah Jane (Elisabeth Sladen) as the companion for the Third and Fourth incarnations of The Doctor. After she left The Doctor, Sarah Jane was back to everyday normal life. Can a companion go back to "normal" life? Sarah Jane decided that she would help aliens who have crash landed on Earth instead. The first episode of the series ran for an hour and a half. Supposedly, people say that the show is "kiddified." However, I didn't find that to be true. Yes, the show is not as dark as Doctor Who but then again Sarah Jane isn't a TimeLord nor is she the last of her race. It's not as sexually charged as Torchwood but then again Sarah Jane said she couldn't find a man who was better than The Doctor. There are still aliens and gadgets and fighting. They are all just done in Sarah Jane's way. (I thought the Sonic Lipstick was cute!) I'm looking forward to future episodes and I hope that the show doesn't get written off as "childish" or something.