What Happened???

Rating: 1/10 (13 June 2008)

First off, I had to come back and change my rating from a two to a one to offset all the 9 and 10 star reviews. Right now the IMDb rating is 6.3 and I'm pretty sure that as more people actually see the film, this will drop significantly. It would appear that there is currently a flood of people calling this a great film which is like calling a pile of my dog's waste products an artistic masterpiece. Now on to the review:
I was really excited about going to see this film on opening night. I like Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel and John Leguizamo and even like most of M. Night Shyamalan's films. The previews looked pretty good and there were some good reviews.
My God, what happened? The acting from the beginning felt very "B Movie", and upon reading other reviews it appears Shyamalan has said this is intended as a B Movie but that is certainly not how it has been marketed. The opening "horrific" scenes were pretty much covered in the previews. Actually, most of the stuff that should have been frightening was covered in the previews, albeit briefly.
I agree with others here that Wahlberg was grossly miscast. Zooey Deschanel was charmingly funny in some parts and in my opinion gave the only real relief from an otherwise total flop.
-------SPOILERS BELOW--------------------------
Now for the plot. The plants are fighting back. Yep. Not only that, they are coordinating attacks on specific groups of people. Large groups at first, then they start picking off the smaller groups with amazing accuracy. You know an attack is coming when the plants manipulate the wind to blow their toxins into the crowds. You see an attack coming as the heavier wind is blowing like a sheet across fields, etc. Yes, really. Not only that, they attack a group in a field but leave another group in a different part of the same field unscathed. I know Wahlberg says something about having to be close to the source or the toxins will dissipate but then how do you explain the construction workers on top of the fairly tall building getting hit so effectively? Makes no sense.
Now I'm all for suspending belief and enjoying a movie for what it is but when a movie is trying to push a message (like this one definitely is) of what COULD happen, I would like at least something to make sense. Very little makes sense with this film and as others have stated, the acting is sub-par and overdone, the screenplay is weak at best and I felt there was little entertainment value at all. I found myself looking at my watch trying to gauge how much longer this would last within the first thirty minutes. I left the theater feeling I've just wasted $20+ and an hour and a half of my life.
If you want to see a truly scary movie about the consequences of what we're doing to our planet, go rent "An Inconvenient Truth". It's more frightening and will be a much better use of your time.