Not perfect, but no where near as bad as people make it out to be

Rating: 8/10 (29 March 2010)

The Happening opened in June of 2008, and over the past three years, it has gotten harder and harder to find a positive review for it, in fact every time I do see a positive review on youtube or something I like it immediately. Under no circumstances is the movie perfect, but I feel that it succeeds in what it is trying to be, a B-Movie. The trailers never really showed this, but days before the film came out, Shyamalan was being interviewed, and said, "We're making an excellent B movie, that's our goal." I would classify this film as a horror film, that never takes itself to seriously, and that's why I like it. I hate when a movie takes itself too seriously, sometimes it can work, but usually the movie just ends up being dull. While the film has some really graphic scenes such as the hair clip through the neck, and being run over with the lawn mower, it also has some really funny moments, like talking to a plastic plant, or the crazy old lady who wonders if Elliot is eying her drink. Because it never takes itself seriously, it is a fun movie, you get the graphic deaths that disturb you, then you also get the funny, stupid scenes that will cheer you up so that you never are too depressed.
Now that I've discussed the misunderstanding people have with this film, lets move on to some of the other things I like. The film really does look amazing, I'll admit Shyamalan was never that good of a writer (exept with Signs, but even in the Sixth Sense, it didn't take a master story teller to hide the twist), but he is a really great director. He never just sets up the camera, he doesn't shake it to add realism, cough "Hurt Locker" cough, and he doesn't jump cut every five second, cough "Wanted" cough. But there are other things I did like.
For example the acting is not nearly as bad as people make it out to be, seriously, on IMDb, a user called the acting cringe inducing. Now I will admit, Zooey Deschanel was HORRIBLE. She gave easily the worst performance, she was fine when she was silent, but when she talked, it was pretty terrible. However I think that Mark Walberg actually did a pretty good job, nothing outstanding, but he wasn't the completely wooden performance that people make him out to be. The rest of the cast is OK, even the little girl, she has only one line but she does so much with complete silence, maybe it's just because she so cute that I don't want anything to happen to her.
Which leads me to my next point, I like these characters, I don't want anything to happen to them. It's like Roland Emmerichs movies, everyone else says there nothing but eye Candy movies, but I actually do care about the characters. I can't say that I cared about Elliot and Alma's relationship problems that much, but I didn't want them to die, so something went right.
The film does have a few good jump scares, and it takes chances by killing people under 18, that actually look like their under 18.
Then theirs the ending, why do people have problems with it, what is so bad about the ending that pisses people off, is it the fact that it the fact that it shows the epidemic is happening somewhere else.
Under no circumstances is The Happening a perfect film, but it's a fun, creepy movie, with decent performances, cool death scenes, and likable characters, that I'm amazed that this film got so much hate, I mean, it got nominated for worst picture and Wanted didn't. Oh and one last thing, the film has probably one of the best tag lines of all time.