Final Cut Express 4 or Adobe Premiere Elements 8?

I would suggest taking a look at this thread

They say there even isn't premiere elements for mac (I can't find it either). Final Cut Expres is more used here. Most of the editors use the Final Cut Studio package, so you would probably find more people here saying that you should use FCE. And most of us use FCE so you would probably find more help with FCE on this forum.

I would also recommend FCE. It runs fast and it can do more than more Premiere Elements. Yes, it cost more - but it offers so much and will be hard to outgrow (unless you get into more complicated video production).

Also, as mentioned, people on this forum use Final Cut Pro 6 (which is very similiar in terms of UI and structure to FCE) so you will get a lot of help.

HOWEVER, if you don't absolutely need an editor ASAP, I would wait until Apple releases FCE 5. The current version is over 2 years old and is due for an upgrade within the next couple of months. But if you do need an editor ASAP, you can't go wrong with FCE 4.

P.S. You do know that working with FC is totally different from iMovie 08. iMovie HD looks more like FC, but 08 will be quite a big difference, it's a way other kind of editing. Take that in mind. Watch some tutorials at YouTube to get an idea.