The original "Scary Movie" was a huge success. The second was painful to sit through. The third showed a small glimmer of hope that the franchise could still entertain. Now, the fourth installment extinguishes that glimmer and crushes most remaining hope.

"Scary Movie 4" once again follows the horror mishaps of Cindy Campbell (Anna Faris, every other "Scary Movie"). Cindy is desperately seeking employment, so taking a cue from "The Grudge," she accepts a job caring for a catatonic older woman (Cloris Leachman, "Young Frankenstein"). There is clearly something a little off about the house, but her boss does everything in his power to keep this hidden from her until she officially moves in.

The house just so happens to be right next door to Tom Ryan (Craig Bierko, "Cinderella Man"). Tom is divorced and a lousy father. His children come to visit, but they clearly do not want to be with him. He attempts to play catch with his son only to embarrass himself by humorously throwing like a girl and tossing it next door, hitting Cindy in the head. This leads up to an unfunny joke about having taken balls to her face in the past.

Soon, aliens send a giant iPod, or as they ingeniously call it a "TriPod," down to Earth. At first, the machine seems to be friendly, playing the Culture Club hit "Karma Chameleon." However, it quickly switches over to its "Destroy Humanity" playlist. This sequence is quite amusing and would have been better had the trailer not already shown it in its near entirety.

The machine opens up and unleashes the more traditional-looking "War of the Worlds" tripods upon the world. Cindy and Tom flee the city, but not together. Perhaps, if fate would have it, they will meet up again by the end of the movie.

Along the way, Cindy meets up with her old friend Brenda (Regina Hall, also every other "Scary Movie") who would seem to have died in the previous installment but now turns out to be working as a reporter instead. Cindy and Brenda go to search for answers in a village much like that in "The Village." The village sequence is barely necessary to the plot, but it has a few amusing moments.

Carmen Electra actually pulls off a decent performance as Holly, the blind girl. For a moment, her performance actually seems believably innocent. Then, of course, she ends up getting down to nothing but a corset. Who ever could have foreseen that?

All the while, the president (Leslie Nielsen, "The Naked Gun") is failing to find a solution. Nielsen is an expert at delivering incredibly idiotic lines in the utmost serious way. If anything, the movie could have used more of him. At the very least, let's hope that he gets at least one more comedic leading role before his career comes to an end.

A twist toward the end is surprisingly satisfying for a film like this, but the way it finally concludes is less than fulfilling. It seems to be heading in a smart direction for once but just sort of peters out with an easy solution. One should not expect brilliance, but it would be nice if there were a little intelligence.

"Scary Movie 4" is not all bad, though. The funniest moments are not parodies of other movies but jokes that play with the dialogue or the audience's expectations. Unfortunately, these are few and far between.

Take for instance a moment in which Tom is telling his buddies at a bar about how sick he is of working down at the docks moving stuff around with a crane all day. Following this statement, he turns around and begins to play the crane game, picking up the exact same kind of crate he had just been moving at work in the previous scene. This joke works.

The main problem with "Scary Movie 4" and countless other recent parodies are that they rely too much on the material from other popular movies. An OK parody simply references popular movies to get an easy laugh. A great parody has its own identity.

Take for instance "Airplane!" from 1980. "Airplane!" practically steals the plot from a 1957 thriller called "Zero Hour!" Hardly anyone who went to see "Airplane!" in 1980 would have even heard of "Zero Hour!" However, "Airplane!" was still a huge hit.

Why? Because it had the ability to stand alone. The comedy did not rely on the other movie, but rather the way in which it was being executed. The dialogue in "Airplane!" was hilarious, and the characters were put into ridiculous situations. It did not matter whether the viewer saw "Zero Hour!" or any other of the movies that it parodied. What mattered was that "Airplane!" was a funny film.

Though it barely shows, "Scary Movie 4" is directed by David Zucker, one of the directors and writers of "Airplane!" and is also co-written by Jim Abrahams, also a writer and director of "Airplane!" Judging by "Scary Movie 4," it would seem as though they have either forgotten how to make a great parody or are being pressured to move in the wrong direction. Hopefully they will come back with another clever comedy someday, but for now, they are stuck with this frightfully uninspired film.

Rating: 2 out of 5