Movie Review : the Happening (2008)

I'm a fan of M. Night Shyamalan's work. Although I can usually shoot gigantic holes through a lot of his story lines, I still appreciate his imagination and flat out balls when it comes to going against the grain. I've heard what he has to say in interviews, and he seems like a very motivated, decent and creative guy with some very good ideas, ideas that are so outside the box that they actually polarize people more than any movie maker in recent history.

The Happening is no exception. M. Night has once again split people down the middle with a simple idea. The idea is that our eco-system, threatened by humans, decides collectively to wipe us out by releasing chemicals into the air that cause severe psychological affects on us, essentially the self-destruction of the human race. Although it is not given as the only reason for this "happening", it is certainly given the most weight. It is explained by the fact that plants release chemicals to drive off or kill animals and insects that feed on them. I found this idea particularly chilling given the current concern with how much damage we're doing to our environment, and it's definitely not so hard to believe when you look at the mysterious resiliency of nature. And the idea is not as far-fetched as some of the recent ideas coming out of Hollywood.

The meat of the story involves a Philadelphia high school teacher, Elliot Moore (played by Mark Wahlberg), his wife Alma Moore (played by Zooey Deschanel), and friend Julian (played by John Leguizamo) as they seek to escape populated areas where the focus of the chemical attacks seem to be. Some flat acting and poor writing make these folks less important than the greater theme which is mass suicide.

From the first scene of the movie, M. Night shows that he's not messing around. The scene takes place in Central Park with two women conversing on a park bench. As they chat and go about their business, isolated screams can be heard in the distance. One friend says to the other, "it looks like those people are clawing at themselves." When she looks back to her buddy, a blank face greets her, promptly followed by her friend taking her hair stick out of her hair and stabbing herself in the neck.

As the affects of the chemicals envelope Central Park in New York, people stop in their tracks and begin offing themselves in the most convenient ways possible. A cop standing in the middle of the street executes himself. His gun falls to the cement only to be picked up by the next person who promptly blows their brains out. Like a death magnet, the gun attracts several more people, one by one, who are ready to end it all.

The other impressive thing about this movie is M. Night's use of sound to carry the affect of death. The scene where the construction workers are watching people leap from buildings is lent more affect when the camera focuses on the faces of the construction workers who are witnessing this. The sounds of people hitting the ground, falling into dumpsters and landing on construction equipment behind youis absolutely unnerving.

There's a car crash that draws audible gasps from people in the theater where I watch the film. People are thrown out of the car with especially grizzly realism. John Leguizamo's character climbs out of the wreckage, sits down in the street and proceeds to saw at his wrists with some glass, also drawing more gasps.

When Elliot and Alma reach a lonely farmstead in the middle of nowhere, home of a bizarre, creepy old lady, we are treated with some excellent shocks. The old lady eventually succumbs to nature by walking around the house and putting her head through windows repeatedly until her face is a mess of gore and glass.

The dialogue in this movie is hit and miss. There are some funny parts that made me laugh out loud, and there are some awkward scenes that made me wonder if M. Night knows how people actually converse in the real world. The pace of this movie is at times a little too deliberate, but the short running time assures that nothing is drawn out for too long.

I agree with M. Night. We humans think we know everything, but we have really never fully understood nature and its mysteries. M. Night's goal with The Happening was to create a good B horror movie, and I think he was pretty close. Work on that dialogue Mr. Shyamalan!

Summary: Aside from some questionable dialogue and awkward scenes, this movie is a keeper if only for the kill scenes alone. Definitely worth seeing.

I give it a strong 7 out of 10.