Rob Lieberman
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Connections, in both directions
The light details allow Peele to play in a big sandbox of references, from Fire in the Sky to Buck and the Preacher , Saturday Night Live , and a wide gamut of Steven Spielberg’s filmography.
Fans of Peele’s previous work would be correct to assume that a horror film is to follow, and while there are a handful of scary and intense sequences, this is much more akin to a film like Jaws or Tremors than it is Fire in the Sky .
There’s a moment about half-way through the film that shifts the energy from Close Encounters of the Third Kind to Fire in the Sky in one terrifying instant of revelation that I, for one, could not have predicted.
It is a terrible shame that the movie now must carry with it a negative stigma because it's a whole lot better than that, earning the right through its very intelligence and air-tight grasp of informed genre filmmaking to be uttered in the same breath as 1993's "Fire in the Sky" and 2002's " Signs ."
Maybe it’s because the aliens’ motives don’t feel real, or maybe it’s the way the film was shot, but at the end of the day you may as well go watch Fire In The Sky on Netflix and see what a real scary alien movie is all about.
Oh, and if you had hoped that the film might open in a matter that brings to mind the still-horrifying moments inside the UFO from 1993’s “Fire in the Sky, ” you’re shockingly in luck.
And while the clearest parallels here are to Orson Welles's War of the Worlds broadcast (the call letters of Everett's radio station are "WOTW") and the paranoid sci-fi flicks of the '50s, but also hints of They Live, while the alien abduction subplot is reminiscent of everything from Fire in the Sky to Mulder and Scully.
In terms of spooky, invasive xenophobia, Olatunde Osunsanmi’s new film isn’t a patch on 1993’s Fire in the Sky, or even 1989’s bug-fuck loopy Communion (aka the movie where Christopher Walken seems more normal after being probed).
Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977)
Directed by Steven Spielberg
influenced Fire in the Sky (1993)
Visuals
The filmmakers use an odd mix of visual imagery, from jokey "flying saucer" symbolism to set and costume designs that seem right out of "Alien" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."
MacBride executes the moment with quick cuts and striking imagery that likens itself to that one horrific scene in Fire in the Sky.
And while there are a few genuinely creepy sequences and images sprinkled throughout the proceedings (ie Tyler listens to a recording of her own abduction), The Fourth Kind clearly would've benefited from a more conventional approach and a greater emphasis on the characters themselves (Patton's police officer is especially underused) - with the almost ridiculously anti-climactic finale ensuring that the whole thing ends on as abrupt a note as one could possibly envision (ie those viewers expecting a Fire in the Sky -esque third act are going to be sorely disappointed).