The Happening

Not so much...

When I first saw previews for the Happening back in December I laughed out loud with most of the theater at Mark Wahlberg's unbelievably silly line of "Can this really be happening?" followed by the even sillier title. M. Night Shyamalan movies have been hit or miss for me. This one was unbelievably bad and I'm not going to lie and say I was expecting a great deal from this film.

I'm also not going to say it "wasn't very happening" because, quite frankly, that would be too easy. It was just a disappointment overall, even Mark Wahlberg's performance, although I mostly blame his character and lines. What can you do with that, honestly? The dialogue in general seemed forced and contrite, and the eerie rustling trees stopped being eerie and started being funny quite early in the film. I'm starting to think perhaps Mr. Shyamalan should just come up with a rough outline for the first half of any future movie and let someone else do the rest.

Let's continue with that thought. A lack of explanations and the distinct overuse of effects (and the huge loss of tomatoes in the making of this movie) just doesn't do it for me. The movie couldn't decide if it was a thriller, a psycho-thriller, or a horror film. It was all three and overall it just lacked direction. M. Night Shamalan needs to find a compass and fast!