THE HAPPENING
The Small Screen
By: Red Vaughn
One thing you’ll learn watching the special features for The Happening is that M. Night Shyamalan wanted to make “the best B-Movie ever,” which goes a long way to explaining the laughably horrendous dialogue in parts of the movie. (At least, more laughable than the unfunny “gag reel” anyway.) Of course, watching the special features, you’ll also realize that Shyamalan as a director is like a spoiled child who’s never been told no. The Sixth Sense was a fantastic movie: extraordinarily well written, solid acting, scary as all get out, and logically constructed. The Happening, on the other hand, resembles Shyamalan’s Signs or The Village by way of sharing a transparent optimism that the nifty “idea” they were born out of was adequate to support an entire film. In this case, it’s “what if plants could kills us” which plays out drearily over 90 minutes. So we get Mark Wahlberg as a high school science teacher in a bumpy (rocky would be too strong a word) marriage to Zooey Deschanel, forced to seek shelter from the mysterious titular event (wherein people suddenly decide to commit suicide en masse by whatever means just “happens” to be handy). But instead of a thoughtful commentary on the environment and what people do amidst mass panic or a fun B-Movie ride, we get a preachy commentary with enormous plot problems, illogical character behavior and laughably dreadful dialogue. A final act appearance by Betty Buckley proves Shyamalan can still pull off the expert creep out, but he really needs to take the time (or find someone to help him do it) to build a real story to go along with it, and not just stack a formula around his next “big idea.” (Red Vaughn)
20th Century Fox, 91 minutes
Release date: October 7
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