The Happening - Anyone seen it?

T

Thrawn

It Wandered In From the Wastes
I was curious to see if anyone has seen The Happening yet. It looks like a good movie but M. Knight doesn't seem to be a very good director... I hated Signs.

Anyone able to provide a spoiler free preview?
 
Phil the Nuka-Cola Dude said:
....Until the reviews arrived.
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Heh.

"The true disaster on display in The Happening is Shyamalan's career hitting rock bottom." - Geoff Berkshire, Metromix.com

"... M. Night desperately needs to find that special someone whose opinion he'll listen to when they say,'No! BAD writer-producer-director! NOT a good idea!'" - Kevin A. Ranson, MovieCrypt.com

Glad to see the M. Night hype has made a full stop. It was a long time coming, really. New Hitchcock my ass, the guy's about as creative as a wooden board.

(no, haven't seen the Happening. Not planning to, either)
 
Brother None said:
"The true disaster on display in The Happening is Shyamalan's career hitting rock bottom." - Geoff Berkshire, Metromix.com
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I thought that happened in the village. I guess that just goes to show that there's no such thing as rock bottom; there's always something lower.

Edit: haven't seen it myself, though. I might give it a try sometime, despite the reviews.
 
After reading the review of "The Orphanage" on that website, I have serious doubts when it comes to trust their opinion.

But on the other hand - if any movie has been rated so low, it must mean something.
 
I am actually keen to see the Orphanage, any good.

As for The Happening- I am waiting for the video. Even Shymalan said that it was a B movie- but a good B movie.

I think it has something to do with vegetation developing a response to human beings- a cloud of dangerous pollens killing people? Not sure if that's ever clearly stated, but I think that's the "cause of the end of the world."

- which I think was once used in either a Star Trek or a Space 1999.

The problem with horror is that-
(1) they don't do creepy but go for the "gotcha shock" moment.
(2) too many psychos
(3) Too much use of the same tropes. I mean, how many vampire movies can one possibly see without someone realizing that vampires are kind of boring.
(4) formula.

What I think someone should do is an HBO or Showtime show based on Lovecraft stories- that would be cool.

But Shymalan- the problem is that he usually tries to hard to send a message and so much of it comes down to characters having an epiphany about some sense of belief.

I liked signs- but the film is really not about aliens invading but a guy rediscovering his faith in God. The sixth sense was fine, the lady in the water- didn't see it. I kind of liked the Village- but I wouldn't want to shell out $8 to see it in a theater- but I would be content to see it on TV.

Really great horror films- are few and far between. Even the most interesting films- the Spinoffs of the Asian films, get a bit hollow after awhile. Dark Water was ok, but not great. The Grudge- a ghost house where the ghost comes after you, and every one of your relatives, because its pissed off?

Horror is still a pretty hard genre to do well.
 
Oh, it's a terrible movie.

There's no real tension or suspense and every time the movie attempts to have one of these things, M. Knight destroys it with loose-brained nonsense.
 
welsh said:
I think it has something to do with vegetation developing a response to human beings- a cloud of dangerous pollens killing people? Not sure if that's ever clearly stated, but I think that's the "cause of the end of the world."
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Basically all plant life, which is sick of being polluted becomes sentient, and releases a neurotoxin that causes humans to commit suicide. Insert a cheesy gorefest, a romance subplot, and a happy ending... and you've got the movie.
I'm a sucker for every horror movie, no matter how trashy so I'll still end up seeing it at some point.
 
Flop said:
I guess that just goes to show that there's no such thing as rock bottom; there's always something lower.
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I don't know about that. A former hit writer-director either working a fast-food drive-through window or just him directing web porn would probably constitute rock-bottom.

That said I am actually a big fan of M. Knight but I agree that his quality has been going down. I loved the Sixth Sense and Unbreakable. I even liked Signs and the Village, but just thinking about those movies doesn't do as much for my intellect as they did originally. I haven't seen the new movie and frankly I don't think that I will it seems to be too full of hype and not enough substance.

I think his problem is that he got stuck in his own type of formula. Slow, but intricately planned shots. Predictable, but three-dimensional characters. Plots that slowly boil but only provide a few thrills. The moral themes of the films are revealed so obviously that they lose any sense of impact.

And then there is the twist - but there has been so much emphasis place on it by the director and by the critics that it has become expected in his movies - and that has ruined the effect of the twist. I mean even the stop-motion show Robot Chicken lampooned him for the twists.

If he would stop relying on the twists then (or stop placing them at the end) and shake up his pacing and make the characters a bit more unpredictable, etc. and maybe even do another writer's script or have another director do one of his scripts, then he could break the collective psychology of movie-goers that his films are slow, formula shlock.

He could take a lesson from Quentin Tarentino, of all people. Yes, Tarentino openly plays homage to some of the trashiest of film genres, but in doing so he finds the formula that made them cult hits. And while he uses shock gross-outs or profanity laced tirades, he finds the center of some of the most intriguing characters, but always does it in an unconventional way. And because in his movies anything can happen the tension is that much thicker and even the corniest of jokes become humorous in the irony of the setting.

M. Knight needs to find a way to spice things up. Even Alfred Hitchcock's films had genuinely tenser moments and feel like they have faster pacing sometimes which is amazing considering the limitations he dealt with at times.
 
Ravager69 said:
After reading the review of "The Orphanage" on that website, I have serious doubts when it comes to trust their opinion.
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Rottentomatoes doesn't have an opinion, ya 'tard, it's a review aggregate site.

welsh said:
I am actually keen to see the Orphanage, any good.
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It's fantastic. It doesn't have a single one of the faults you name as horrors usually having.
 
Geoff Berkshire said:
"The true disaster on display in The Happening is Shyamalan's career hitting rock bottom."
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...I'm pretty sure his peak was in casting Bruce Willis in the Sixth Sense. I hate M. Night, so glad he's finally getting some shit from people. My god is this a guy a pretentious waste of space.
 
I thought it was ok. As someone else said, it was a damn good B movie. I think the biggest attraction to PA movies isn't the horror element. Instead, I belive that PA movies make all of us feel a tad bit more special. Kinda like how the discussion after a PA movie always involves, "I would have survived this way because its much more feasible/realistic/rational.
 
The Happening SUCKED. It was one of the worst films I've ever seen. What a waste of time, money, and materials.
-Awful directing: Dialogue and movements were static and did not string together. You could really tell you were watching a movie with this one.
-Really pushing for the R rating: Every shot of violence or death was overdone. They would just hold the camera on it for as long as possible, to the point of annoyance. Not annoyance because it was violent, but more like "Get on with it". Note the pleas of the advertising, too. "Shyamalan's first R-rated film", they say it in a tone like "No! Look! He's doing something different! We promise it won't suck as much as his other films, because it's rated R this time!"
-Unrealistic character interactions: The way people in this movie talked with one another, and the way they reacted to things happening around them was not the way normal people would be. Example: The train stopped, everyone got out, and no one asked the conductor or drivers what the deal was. Then Markie-Mark flips out about "one useless fact after another", when he only asked two questions, and got two reasonable answers. And why were none of the passengers talking to each other?
-Unrealistic violence: A police officer shoots himself in the head with his pistol. No knockback or lean of his body after a point-blank Glock-blast to his head, he just slowly fell, and we saw a tiny hole barely bleeding from the center of his head. Am I the only one who knows how powerful a police officer's gun is? Also, the lion scene. A lion barely nibbles a man's hand and pulls off the arm like straw, without any effort. The man didn't even get pulled one inch, the arm just slid out. Clearly Shyamalan just really wanted that R-rating.

Shyamalan needs to quit pretending he's the greatest story writer because of his twists. This self-righteous douche thinks that because no one figured it out, it was a good twist. If I made a war movie, and Side A was about to defeat Side B, but suddenly it ends because it turns out they were all just toys and the kids have to go eat dinner now, would I make as much money as this half-wit Shyamalan? God, I hate that guy. I liked The 6th Sense and Unbreakable, but seriously, he's just so full of himself now. His mind ran away with his money. I hope he loses a lot on this one.
 
Yawgmoth43 said:
The Happening SUCKED. It was one of the worst films I've ever seen. What a waste of time, money, and materials.
-Awful directing: Dialogue and movements were static and did not string together. You could really tell you were watching a movie with this one.
-Really pushing for the R rating: Every shot of violence or death was overdone. They would just hold the camera on it for as long as possible, to the point of annoyance. Not annoyance because it was violent, but more like "Get on with it". Note the pleas of the advertising, too. "Shyamalan's first R-rated film", they say it in a tone like "No! Look! He's doing something different! We promise it won't suck as much as his other films, because it's rated R this time!"
-Unrealistic character interactions: The way people in this movie talked with one another, and the way they reacted to things happening around them was not the way normal people would be. Example: The train stopped, everyone got out, and no one asked the conductor or drivers what the deal was. Then Markie-Mark flips out about "one useless fact after another", when he only asked two questions, and got two reasonable answers. And why were none of the passengers talking to each other?
-Unrealistic violence: A police officer shoots himself in the head with his pistol. No knockback or lean of his body after a point-blank Glock-blast to his head, he just slowly fell, and we saw a tiny hole barely bleeding from the center of his head. Am I the only one who knows how powerful a police officer's gun is? Also, the lion scene. A lion barely nibbles a man's hand and pulls off the arm like straw, without any effort. The man didn't even get pulled one inch, the arm just slid out. Clearly Shyamalan just really wanted that R-rating.

Shyamalan needs to quit pretending he's the greatest story writer because of his twists. This self-righteous douche thinks that because no one figured it out, it was a good twist. If I made a war movie, and Side A was about to defeat Side B, but suddenly it ends because it turns out they were all just toys and the kids have to go eat dinner now, would I make as much money as this half-wit Shyamalan? God, I hate that guy. I liked The 6th Sense and Unbreakable, but seriously, he's just so full of himself now. His mind ran away with his money. I hope he loses a lot on this one.
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Nice and insightful review.

Thanks! ;)
 
I only liked the Sixth Sense. I have no idea why he is such a big deal for some. I could not finish watching a single other movie he's made. Not only are they extremely amateurish, they're boring as hell. The only amazing thing about Shamalayan, or however you spell it, is that he somehow managed to make Sixth Sense a decent movie.
 
i havent seen the movie, but:
Yawgmoth43 said:
No knockback or lean of his body after a point-blank Glock-blast to his head, he just slowly fell, and we saw a tiny hole barely bleeding from the center of his head.
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gunshot wounds to NOT cause knockback. sure, maybe a centimeter or ten if hit by a 12 gauge slug, but any more that's holywood. basically, when shot, you sag to the ground like a sack o' potatoes.

as for the tiny hole, you do realise that the entry wound of a 9x19mm (at least i take it it's a 9mm Glock, since you're talking of a policeman. might be .40S&W though) is just that: 9mm. the exitwound will be bigger, of course (9x19mm FMJ is a strong penetrator and will surely go through & through). thought the exit wound wont be anything stellar.

Yawgmoth43 said:
Am I the only one who knows how powerful a police officer's gun is?
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apparently...

:roll:
 
I thought Signs was ok. I liked the Sixth Sense. I can see why people were disappointed with the Village, but I didn't mind it.

I think that Shyamalan gets the good hype because he's young and people remember the Sixth Sense, which was a pretty big film. In some ways, the Sixth Sense was a throwback to some of the older supernatural films that were not the splatter fests we see today- an effort to make "real" horror films.

THat said, I think that the Happening was actually an effort to rebuild his sagging career. Signs met mixed reviews, the Village got worse, the Lady in the Water got hammered. Now the Happening is sagging.
 
So I just started watching the movie. I'm 22 minutes in and have come to two conclusions. One; HUGE miscast for marky mark, and two; the dialog is painfully bad.

*edit*

Just finished it. My god was that awful.
 
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