The Happening (2008)

When I first saw the trailer for 'The Happening', I was quite excited at the prospect of another film by M. Night Shyamalan. After all, I enjoyed all his previous films, save 'Lady in the Lake', and was sure he would deliver another breath-taking blockbuster. Sadly, I was wrong and while the film was not a turkey, it was not of the excellence I had expected.

The film sees some sort of mysterious ecological event leading to people committing mass suicide, the phenomenon spreading first from large cities then to smaller towns until it is clear a huge chunk of the East Coast is affected. At first, it is assumed to be a terrorist attack but, as more and more people are spontaneously kill themselves, it is clear the cause may be something else entirely...

One of the problems with the film was the quality of the acting and the characters themselves. Mark Wahlberg stars as Elliot, the science teacher who is our main protagonist, and he does flounder in many scenes as if he forgets he's playing an intelligent but ordinary everyday guy, not a gung-ho military hero who is cool in all situations. He could have injected more emotion into his performance. Zooey Deschanel plays Elliot's girlfriend Alma and she too fails to make the audience care for her with the way she depicts the character to be some sort of an escapee from a teeny-booper romance flick. To be fair, it is not entirely Deschanel's fault as Alma is a weak, self-centred character with the emotional capacity of a young adolescent (for example, she puts Elliot and a child at risk a couple of times with her stupid decisions and, at the start, when it's clear people are dying, she is in a huff because Elliot and his friend 'hurt' her feelings).

When it comes to the actual storyline, the plot does start off intriguingly and there are many chilling moments when we see people are coolly committing suicide like mindless zombies. However, the finale doesn't deliver what the build-up promised. There are no real explanations or solid end result. In many ways, this film is similar to Shyamalan's previous project 'Signs' both in terms of a mass disaster and no real end resolution to the events but 'Signs' worked better because the characters were more effectively portrayed and their personal storyline was enough of a finale to compensate. This is not the case in 'The Happening' where the storyline fizzles out.

Overall, this is by no means a terrible film. It is enjoyable and fits nicely into the apocalyptic genre but 'Signs' has done this sort of idea before and did it better. That said, there was not only moments that had me on the edge of my seat but also lines which were quite humorous. And certainly, it does make one think about the state of the planet in regards to whether humanity does have it coming to them and how we would cope in such an event. It is worth a look, especially in a week when the other premiere is 'The Hulk, a film aimed at keeping twelve-year-olds' entertained.

Fmovies: What can I say. This movie sucked. Not even Mark Wahlberg, whom I rate as a great actor, could save this turkey.

I don't intend to include any spoilers, unless you include the fact that nothing of any note goes on in this picture. Equally the script seems to be written from the perspective of a naive 10 year old for a U-rated audience. The details concerning the relationship friction between the central characters seem so childlike as to be pointless.

Zooey Deschanel, who I enjoyed in Failure to Launch, seems completely miscast or just terrible. Her principle role seems to be to appear as a giant doe-eyed girl stumbling from scene to scene as though awakening from a drug-induced coma.

Shyamalan made a great first movie and I also enjoyed Unbreakable. Other than that he's been sliding into an abyss of drivel and somebody needs to stop funding his crap so I can stop kidding myself into sitting through it with the idea that surely this time it'll be worth it.

Let me preface these comments by saying that I am a major Night fan. I look forward to news of his next project and love the stories of his supposed total control over his movies and carte blanche from the studios. If those stories are true, I have a feeling that era will be ending for Night with the release of The Happening. I ignored all the pre-release press I could before going to see this movie. I read none of the reviews, but one word I did catch was "uninspired." Unfortunately, that one word describes this movie perfectly. In the first ten minutes of the movie, I thought it was due to the acting and that maybe Mark Wahlberg was miscast. However, after another ten minutes I realized it wasn't the actors; it was the extremely lame script. Without giving away any details, this is a disaster film where the disaster "happening" starts with the first scene of the movie. Unfortunately, no suspense builds and there is absolutely no sense of dread or panic on screen and so none translates to the audience. Surprising, since the 21st century has provided us with too many occasions to study how we react in times of disaster, whether by nature or terrorism. It's as if Night ignored all this when writing the story. The characters sleepwalk through the scenes (and, no, it's not a symptom of "the happening") with no believable sense of the horrible events taking place. Granted, we don't need to see people running around in circles screaming and crying, but people do not stand in small groups after a disaster calmly taking turns talking one at a time. Without sharing in any of the horror that the characters are suppose to be experiencing, the film is a total bore for the audience and the source of "the happening" is laughable when revealed. I found myself repeatedly checking my watch, saying, "I can't believe how bad this is" – not something I'd expect to do in a Night movie. Looking around the theater, I could tell others were sharing the same feelings. Most were scrolling through emails or texting on their phones.

During the movie, since I wasn't paying much attention to the screen, I started thinking that there might be a good reason why most filmmakers do not have total control over their films. When they do, they can reach a point that it seems Night may have reached, where they say, "I'm going to make people scared when the wind blows" and actually believe themselves. Maybe other producers or execs can step in at that point and bring the filmmaker back to reality. I'm not giving up on Night, but I'll feel better if his next film is not "Written, Produced and Directed by M. Night Shyamalan."

The Happening fmovies. Shyamalan has proved to us earlier that he can be as good as the best with masterpieces of cinema with The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. Yet, since then, he has declined steadily. Signs and Village were good movies, but with Lady in the Water and now The Happening, he has touched a level of incompetence that could never have been expected of him.

The Happening is about a pandemic that is gripping north-eastern USA. It starts with a stunning sequence of events that show people succumb to an unspecified threat – the brilliance of this opening repeated only once more for a five-minute sequence towards the end of the movie. Unfortunately, Shyamalan's writing is a big let-down for the rest. As the focus moves from metropolitans to towns and from crowds to smaller groups, the sense of fear is lost – the biggest sin a horror movie can commit. In the oft repeated criticism for its director, this movie would have been best served as a half-hour episode of Twilight Zone to make it really work.

And to add woe, the actors do not do much to better the experience – Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel are grossly miscast as the protagonists. Any of his previous leading men (Bruce Willis, Mel Gibson, Joaquin Phoenix and Paul Giamatti) can be imagined to have done a better job for the Science teacher that Wahlberg plays. The camera scrutinizes the performance to a degree that requires an actor with strength in emotions – Wahlberg instead brings a physical presence that the role does not need. Zooey, on the other hand, struts around like in a Disney movie, not for once threatened by the pandemonium.

This time, though Shyamalan humbles his vanity – you don't see him on screen. He now should swallow his pride and leave the writing to the writers. Armed with a better script, we can still expect Shyamalan to make his future movies worth waiting for. For now it is only the memory of the opening sequence, which can be proclaimed as mind-numbing greatness, which is really worth taking away from this movie.

I hate this. I want to tell you guys that this was Shyamalan's comeback and that this film is just as terrifying as you've been promised. But, I cannot.

The film starts off actually quite well. Minus some less than stellar acting (in fact, its horrible) and some just as bad dialogue, I really thought that maybe this film could pull it off. Disturbing death scenes ensue.

Then, bring in Mark Wahlberg. What happened to this guy? Nominated for an Oscar for his turn in The Departed, Wahlberg seems like a safe bet, but in actuality, he's playing a role that just isn't made for him. This role was made for someone nicer. Walhberg has been typecast time and time again as the angry and bad-ass guy, and now I see why. He's good at that and god awful at being nice.

No one else is particularly good either. Zoey Deschanel disappoints, John Leguizamo (Everyone in this movie has a name that's difficult to spell), and all of the extras are just as bad. There is not a single moment of good acting in this movie.

And all of that is because of how rushed this film feels. This is one of those movies that it seriously felt like the director was working on a very limited budget and then took the first take for every actor, none of them had a chance to get into their roles (or so I hope).

It's obvious who will get all of the blame for this (M. Night Shyamalan) and it's really too bad. I can't say that the plot is necessarily bad, it isn't, and with maybe one more draft the script would've been good. The faults of this film all land on Night's shoulders though. I hate to say it because I am very much not a hater of his (I love The Sixth Sense, Unbreakable, and Signs) but I'm forced to say I hate this movie. Not so much for how bad it actually is (it's very bad) but because I really had faith in the director. The trailers almost felt promising and Shyamalan (am I even spelling this right?) promised me that I'd walk out shaking. Instead, I was shaking my head in disappointment.

One thing I'd like to add on though, I can tell that they were going for a Hitchcock vibe and the best way I feel that I can describe this is "a very bad version of The Birds." That is all.

Who keeps giving M. Night Shyamalan money to make these movies? Seriously, what studio executive read this script and thought that making this movie would be a good idea? After the disaster that was Lady in the Water Shyamalan comes back with a movie which unbelievably, almost impossibly, may actually be worse. Lousy acting, laughably bad dialogue and a story which is just downright stupid combine to make one terrible movie.

Anyhow the story here is that starting in New York City and then quickly spreading through the Northeast everyone is suddenly killing themselves. Everyone drops what they're doing, seemingly goes catatonic for a moment and then offs themselves anyway they can. Fling themselves off the top of a building, shoot themselves in the head...whatever. What could possibly make people do this? Obviously it must be some kind of terrorist attack or so everyone thinks. There certainly is something bad in the air and people need to flee. And here we meet our main characters, a Philadelphia high school science teacher and his wife along with his friend and his friend's daughter. They get out of the city, inevitably get stuck in the middle of nowhere, the characters begin to do and say things which make no sense whatsoever and the whole movie falls apart as we watch people try to run away from the wind.

Mark Wahlberg has the central role here and his performance is truly awful. Certainly he isn't helped by the hideous script but it really seems as if Wahlberg can do nothing right. He seems rather emotionless for a guy trying to figure out why everyone's engaging in mass suicide. As his wife, Zooey Deschanel goes through the film with a blank stare on her face. Some of the corpses show more life. Most of the other characters we meet make a bad impression if they make any impression at all. Some truly bizarre people wander in and out of this movie. And all of them are forced to spout dialogue which is so bad it often becomes unintentionally funny. Somebody wrote that? Really? Ha-ha. But as bad as the acting and dialogue are it's the story which is the biggest problem. Once the movie reveals what actually is happening it becomes impossible to take the story seriously. Stupid. So very, very stupid. The premise makes no sense, doesn't work at all, and thus the movie is doomed to failure. I really can't fathom that after reading the script anyone actually encouraged Shyamalan to go ahead and make this movie. The Sixth Sense sure was a long time ago.