Incoherent, uninteresting and slow!

Rating: 3/10 (20 June 2008)

Okay, so I saw this trailer a few weeks ago for what seemed like an interesting movie. Something about a mysterious event, something about disappearing bees, something about people fleeing the big cities and something about a natural disaster. Seemed kinda new and suspenseful compared to the usual crappy Hollywood-flick trailers packed with action, one-liners and Kodak-moments. Besides, Mark Wahlberg usually performs quite fair in my opinion, so of course I decided to watch this movie on the big screen. Unfortunately, what I didn't realize was that the trailer WAS the movie! That was f...... it! There is no more to this movie than what the trailer reveals! Of course there is a lot of characters babbling back and forth, trying to explain the "happening", quite a bit of gore and a whole bunch of weird Shyamalan-like scenes, doing absolutely nothing whatsoever to progress the movie. WTF! If you're into that kinda useless stuff, you should definitely watch this flick. The rest of you should just watch the trailer and be happy that I just spared you ninety minutes of incoherent bull.
Well, allow me to correct myself. The movie takes of quite well, kinda like the trailer "promised". The unknown threat that suddenly reveals itself to mankind is merciless and intriguing but is eventually reduced to an incoherent phenomenon pseudo-scientifically explained as a plant conspiracy against mankind or something like that. Anyway, after approximately twenty-five minutes or so, the movie just die in a way. Nothing of greater importance to the overall plot of the movie happens after this point! Now, everyone knows that M. Night Shyamalan usually adds a nice plot twist towards the end of his movies making them a little more watchable. So I waited patiently for this twist to come. Was it all just a dream? Was Mark Wahlberg actually a ghost? Was the government behind the mysterious event? I waited anxiously! I needed a twist! Anykind of twist, no matter how lame!! But the damn twist never came! This movie is completely and utterly straight forward! Simple in the bad way. Excuse the blasphemy, but Jesus Christ! I'd rather have a buffalo take a diarrhea dump in my ear than sit through the last hour of this flick once again. It is so uninteresting! So boring! The dialogue is just, well, abundant and many of the scenes just don't do anything!
Now, many people will most likely ignore the terrible plot and give me a lecture about how the movie is not at all about the characters and their exodus, but instead a symbol of how mankind is punished for his misdeeds against Nature and bla bla bla. Erh, yeah! That particular subplot was just as subtle as a tank in a mini-market, thank you! If a professional writer can't think of a better way to propagate this message, than making plants go postal, Hollywood is on really thin ice! Gee, I wondered why a scene had a big dirty nuclear power plant as a "discrete" background. Humiliating and clumsy symbolism, that's what that is. And as for the other subplots, these are just boring. Something about Wahlberg's wife having an affair and something about, no wait, that was it. WTF! As for the cast, Wahlberg hasn't exactly received applause for his role as the protagonist Elliot. I'm not sure I agree tough. I think he does a decent job most of the time, considering the terrible plot and the weird lines he has to work with. He is definitely not the one to blame.
So, all in all, "The Happening" is a piece of junk not worth a view in my opinion. Three keywords: incoherent, uninteresting and slow. Don't expect anything.