Shown in Theater Number 4, cute, huh? The story of a group of aliens being hunted by another group of aliens all of whom have supernatural powers and are hiding in plain sight here on Earth-while blowing up everything they run across and showing up on YouTube. It’s a pretty standard issue story and a movie only made possible by super cheap CGI.
Like all setup movies, I Am Number Four is crammed full of dull and boring backstory about our super hunk alien and the nasty fish people who want to kill him. Only it’s backstory that doesn’t really tell us anything useful or interesting. About ninety perfect of I Am Number Four is set dressing for the next movie-if there ever is a next movie.
It’s just like Cirque du Freak, The Last Airbender, and The Golden Compass-this first film is just the start of the next Harry Potter/Lord of The Rings/Star Wars-only none of them are exactly Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, or Star Wars. I Am Number Four might make a good Syfy or WB-I mean CW-show. One of those never ending stories where our heroes wander from town to town looking for whatever it is they are always looking for. Then you can have a Series finale where Something Happens.
Ok, I Am Number Four had a number of good action sequences and it was easy enough to root for the beautiful good guys over the ugly and slimy bad guys. But it was kind of pointless. Somewhere along the line people who make movies forgot that you make sequels of Successful Films-you don’t make a ton of open ended films in the hopes that one of them will take off and be a megahit. Cameron didn’t make a Titanic II.
But who knows? Maybe a nice boxed set of all three or four or two movies will make sense and be a fun way to spend an idle afternoon. Or maybe not. How cheap does the CGI have to be to keep cranking out these turkeys?
