Well looks like the cat is slowly clawing its way out of the bag on the legitimacy of The Fourth Kind. Earlier this week there was a report on the i09 about someone who was involved with the production of the film talking about how all the “real” footage in the film was indeed staged. The insider also noted that the film, which was shot entirely on HD even somehow managed to go over budget.
Today Newsvine reports Universal, the studio behind the film has agreed to pay $20,000 dollars to the Alaska Press Club to settle complaints about fake news archives used to promote the film. Apparently this was in reference to the websites I noted in my previous write-up that mysteriously disappeared, which included an obituary and news story about the death of a character in the movie, Dr. William Tyler, that supposedly were from the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner.
The film which I couldn’t find an actual number for a budget has done 15 million so far at the box office, and a $20,000 settlement seems like quite a small price to pay for the publicity these faked viral ads got the film. The Fourth Kind has done surprisingly well since its release, a normal horror film for example usually tops out at 25 million during its entire theatrical run and the fourth kind has only been out a week now, and even beat The Box last week which surprised quite a few people in the film industry. All I can say is this whole fiasco is going to make one hell of a dvd documentary.