First Lady in the Water, and now this?

Rating: 1/10 (27 June 2008)

M.Night Shyamalan caused a lot of controversy amongst cinema goers nowadays. What started as a hugely promising career (with The Sixth Sense) has rapidly gone downhill, his last movie Lady in the Water being loathed by the majority, and loved by a very small minority. I'll confess to being unsure what to make of his movies. The Sixth Sense in my opinion was overrated, Unbreakable was a classic and his best, Signs had moments of brilliance but a bad ending, The Village was so focused on its twists it got dull quick, and then there was Lady. Lady was something I watched five times and each time changed my opinion. I hated it first time, loved it second time, was confused by it third, and the past two times I've just been left a bit blank by it. Its a misconceived movie for sure, but its very well made. And now we get onto The Happening, something that I was dreading seeing. The critics have slaughtered the movie and the early screenings were full of negativity. Still I went into the cinema two days ago, only after being turned away for seeing Wanted, and watched it. Now I expected it to be bad, I never expected it to be this bad. I did enjoy myself while watching the movie, but unfortunately it was because I was laughing at how bad it was. The Happening is simply a disaster on every level. The script, acting and directing is just terrible. The movie is easily one of the worst films I have ever seen and bare in mind I have seen Meet the Spartans. Mark Wahlberg is diabolical, Zooey Deschanel seems bored and confused by the experience, the storyline just seems confused, the ending stinks of anticlimax, and there are so many scenes that aim for serious but are stupidly funny because of it.
As I previously said the acting was horrendous. But was this really the actors fault? I am unsure as of yet, the script is horrendous but I am sure the actors could have made a bit more effort. Mark Wahlberg is very lucky to have any credibility left after this movie. If he hadn't have delivered a killer of a performance in The Departed I would avoid all future movies with him in. He is just terrible. Miscast and terrible. A scene where a companion shoots themselves sees Wahleberg response being "Oh no". I burst out laughing there and then. A later scene where he talks to a plant, yes you are reading that correct, just left me gob smacked. Zooey Deschanel at first is even worse than Wahlberg. Her opening scene is horrendous, in fact I was worried for Deschanel as it seemed like she had forgotten completely how to act. She does get better towards the end, but the script drags her down and her final scenes just annoyed me. The always reliable John Leguizamo does a decent job in his all too few scenes and his final sequence is one of the very, very few highlights. Yet he is in the movie for about half an hour, it annoys me as if Shyamalan had sense he would have realised Leguizamo had a better character and the audience would have been more interested in watching his story. Oh and the worst person in the movie, has to be the random crazy old lady played by Betty Buckley. Had the script and storyline allowed she could have had a decent character here, but she is just absurd and has the worst scenes in the movie by far. That and her and Wahlberg have the worst scene of the year, which basically ends in Wahlberg uttering in false amazement, "What? No."
The Happening has so many more problems than the actors though. The first problems begin when we actually see the people begin killing themselves, while on paper standing still and uttering mad things then killing yourself might sound decent. The way it is done on screen is laughable. A scene where people jump of building sites aims for horrifying, but just ends up ludicrous, I found that scene funny as did the majority of people in the cinema. The storyline itself just gets worse and worse, when we find out what the actual "happening" is you just roll your eyes in disappointment. Not only is the "happening" never properly explained, but it seems to change constantly, one moments it involves small groups of people, the next that idea is thrown out the window and we have them running away from the wind. I really had no idea what was really going on near the end, it wasn't confusing just misconceived. The movie has next to no thrills, the running away from wind sequence is laughable and the suicide scenes gradually get repetitive. And then we get to the ending. There is one scene near the end featuring Wahlberg and Deschanel walking towards each other in the wind, I won't spoil it, but that one scene actually gave me hope. Had what I though was going to happen actually happened the movie might have had a tiny bit of redemption. It looked like the movie was actually taking a risk. Alas it doesn't and we end up with an ending miles worse than Signs could ever offer. The movie is a giant anticlimax, and the very final scene just amplifies this all the more.
Based on The Happening I would actually argue Shyamalan should consider another career path, or at least realise he cannot write a decent script and stop writing them. All involved in this movie should just move on quickly and pretend it never happened. This is the first true failure of the summer, and what a huge failure it is. I recommend you watch it, but only to see one of the greatest failures of recent years.