This is topic The Happening in forum Film Handlers' Movie Reviews at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.


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Posted by Mike Schindler (Member # 1309) on 06-13-2008, 02:44 PM:
 
M. Night Shyamalan needs to just stop making movies.

If he must make movies, he should do a romantic comedy, or musical, or something that doesn't involve wide-angle closeups of people with expressions of shock on their faces.

This thing looks and feels like it was written and directed by a first-year film student. It's laughably bad.
 

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Posted by Dan Lyons (Member # 1454) on 06-13-2008, 04:43 PM:
 
watched this crap last night.

Total garbage.

OMG! The plants and trees are getting revenge on humans!!
 

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Posted by Michael Barry (Member # 237) on 06-14-2008, 02:29 AM:
 
I saw the 1:15am(!) session at the AMC Empire 25 at Times Square. It was the only show not yet sold out. The print was interlocked with the cinema next door and both sessions were sold out. Every session for this movie at this location sold out tonight, despite having a digital print and what seemed like 4 X 35MM prints (and at least one interlock). Being from Sydney, this is somewhat outside my reality. Freaky!

Count me in as someone who enjoyed it! I liked it more than almost all his other movies.

I was invested the whole way through; the movie felt more even throughout than his other films (to me). There are some stunning sequences and the whole thing just mesmerised me.

I'm probably alone on this; the packed house I saw it with didn't react very well to the ending at all...but the optimist in me hopes that word of mouth is pretty good anyway and that it will end up doing well nonetheless.
 

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Posted by Scott McGuire (Member # 4508) on 06-14-2008, 05:57 PM:
 
I agree garbage. If i wasn't screeing it i'm pretty sure i would have walked out.
 

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Posted by Michael Gonzalez (Member # 593) on 06-14-2008, 08:08 PM:
 
Bummer. I had actually been looking forward to seeing this after seeing the trailer.

Has there ever been any other director or film maker who can continue to pack houses baised on their notoriety over one great film. It seems that everyone goes to see his movies hoping that it will be as good but it doesnt look like that will ever happen.
 

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Posted by Allison Parsons (Member # 2728) on 06-15-2008, 02:07 AM:
 
Saw it tonight. Honestly, I didn't hate it. I loved the premise, but it did seem like he kind of half-assed the movie, or just didn't give it his all.

The biggest complaint that I had throughout the movie was THE ACTING WAS HORRIBLE! Just horrid.

quote:

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OMG! The plants and trees are getting revenge on humans!!

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Let me guess, you hated The Invasion of the Body Snatchers too

2.5 out of 5 stars.
 

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Posted by Kurt Zupin (Member # 2751) on 06-15-2008, 04:12 AM:
 
This film was horrible, it flat out sucked. The acting is horrible, the movie looks like it was shot for CBS. Looks like a made for tv movie. Oh and they are running from FUCKING wind!!

0/5
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 06-15-2008, 04:35 AM:
 

quote: Kurt Zupin

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This film was horrible, it flat out sucked. The acting is horrible, the movie looks like it was shot for CBS. Looks like a made for tv movie.

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quote: Michael Barry

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I saw the 1:15am(!) session at the AMC Empire 25 at Times Square. It was the only show not yet sold out. The print was interlocked with the cinema next door and both sessions were sold out. Every session for this movie at this location sold out tonight, despite having a digital print and what seemed like 4 X 35MM prints

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quote:

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-- an example of really superb marketing.

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quote: Tom Mundell

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drat, I was looking forward to this too...so far at Rotten Tomatoes it's got a 20% on the tomato meter...not too promising...

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quote: Mark Ogden

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Say what you want, but the guy certainly has his own vision.

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That's the problem. It's his "vision," as in singular. He only knows how to make one type of movie, and it's a hard type of movie to make well. I like the idea of bending other genres to fit his vision, which is why UNBREAKABLE is so good.

Some of his other movies have interesting concepts as well, but the execution is unbelievably bad. He uses Hitchcock-like techniques without comprehension of how or why those techniques work. His actors are given such terrible dialogue, and required to hit marks with such acrobatic precision that their performances are lifeless.

I will continue to give this guy the benefit of the doubt in the hopes that one day, he makes another great movie like THE SIXTH SENSE or UNBREAKABLE, but I'm not holding my breath.

However, I do agree that you should ignore what others say, and decide for yourself whether or not it's good.
 

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Posted by Tom Mundell (Member # 4555) on 06-15-2008, 04:57 PM:
 
I typically do go to movies regardless of the reviews, and probably will still make it to see this in the next week or so, but when there's this many bad reviews I have a tendency to end up going to other movies I'm interested in first...

I really enjoyed Lady in the Water, and Unbreakable is my favorite of his. I've been meaning to rent The Village for a while now, missed it in theaters.
 

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Posted by Mark J. Marshall (Member # 1409) on 06-16-2008, 01:22 PM:
 
M. Night should really just make trailers for other people's movies. In addition to the film's subtle left wing propaganda being annoying, and the acting being forced, and the dialog being bad, and the plot being unbelievable, the Kaahumanu 6 in Maui not only presented the movie out of frame for us, but managed to scratch their print after having it for only one day. Nice job, morons.
 

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Posted by Thomas Pitt (Member # 4322) on 06-16-2008, 03:18 PM:
 
Cinema: Bradford Cineworld Screen 11
Format: 35mm w/Dolby Digital
Presentation problems: Picture shook irregularly; particularly bad in the 2nd reel. It was as if someone was adjusting the framing control slightly up and down at random.

Well, it wasn't a 'disaster' of a movie like I expected from the Rottentomatoes reviews, but it wasn't that good either. The premise was fairly good, but the film was too long and the acting mediocre. Nevertheless, I still enjoyed it enough not to walk out. Something like this would be more suited to a half-hour episode of some TV sci-fi series, not a whole movie!

I'm a bit concerned about the ending though - do they plan a sequel to this movie? I don't think you could squeeze any more out of this premise than has already been done!
 

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Posted by Geena Phillips (Member # 3726) on 06-16-2008, 04:12 PM:
 
Jumping Xenu on a pogo stick, this thing is AWFUL. At least there'll be one hit comedy this summer after all.
 

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Posted by Chad M Calpito (Member # 3736) on 06-16-2008, 05:40 PM:
 
Since I saw the trailers to this film, I figured I would check this movie out. But, now, I have doubts that I will after reading this forum.
 

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Posted by Sam Graham (Member # 2889) on 06-17-2008, 10:39 PM:
 
CINEMA: Cinemark Movies 12, Ames, IA
AUDITORIUM: 7
PRESENTATION: 35mm/Mystery Meat Crapposonic audio
PRESENTATION PROBLEMS: The audio was HIDEOUS
RATING: One and one half star (out of four)

WARNING: "You're at the place where the killers meet to decide what to do with the Spoilers."

THE PLOT: New Yorkers read Bobby and Mark's Blu-ray debate on Film-Tech and start killing themselves. Wackiness ensues.

I read somewhere that all Shyamalan wanted to get out of this picture was his own version of a low-budget B-movie slasher flick. If you know that going in, you might give him some breathing room. But he really didn't do a good job of translating that to the screen.

The acting was crap (I suspect it was supposed to be so), the visuals were uninteresting by Shyamalan's standards, and the SHOCKING SWERVE we get at the end of every Shyamalan movie isn't here at all.

Good idea, poorly executed.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 06-17-2008, 11:20 PM:
 
I wish M. Night would make a comedy with a surprise twist at the end. Like all the characters die in a car crash or something.

He's becoming one of those directors whose trailers are better than his movies.
 

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Posted by Michael Gonzalez (Member # 593) on 06-17-2008, 11:25 PM:
 
Ugh. I bit the bullet and finally saw this and it is with out a doubt the most boring movie I have ever sat through. Maybe 10 minutes of the movie was somewhat interesting but even that is a stretch.

I was going to list a bunch of stupid things from the film but it is not even worth the effort. I think it is time for Mr. Shyamalan to decide if he is going to be a director (applying his "vision" to someone else's script) or a film writer (with another director applying their vision to Shyamaln's script) because he no longer seems capable of doing both.

Unless he finally does a sequel to "Unbreakable" as originally planned, I will probably have no interest in seeing another one of his films.


What the "killer" should have looked liked...
 

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Posted by Mark Ogden (Member # 43) on 06-18-2008, 07:12 AM:
 
Killer trees with faces? It's been done.


 

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Posted by Robert Crabtree (Member # 4795) on 06-20-2008, 01:48 AM:
 
So horrible...the only scary part was everytime I saw John Leguizamo's teeth... something fanglike about them.

Did anyone else fight back the urge to start singing "It's Rainin' Men" in the beginning?
 

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Posted by Brian Michael Weidemann (Member # 2243) on 06-20-2008, 03:48 AM:
 
Some of us don't fight it.
 

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Posted by Andy Frodsham (Member # 4061) on 06-22-2008, 02:38 PM:
 
Thank Goodness - I was starting to believe it was just me! I think his films are simplistic and highly predictable. I think SIGNS is the only half-decent film he has made and that was largely due to a solid cast!
 

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Posted by Michael Gonzalez (Member # 593) on 06-22-2008, 05:46 PM:
 

quote:

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I think SIGNS is the only half-decent film he has made and that was largely due to a solid cast!

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If you havent already, you should check out the Signs review thread. I know I took a pretty good beating for liking and trying to defend that film

[ 06-23-2008, 03:58 PM: Message edited by: Michael Gonzalez ]
 

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Posted by Michael Brown (Member # 890) on 06-23-2008, 08:37 PM:
 
Vue Leeds The Light ,Screen 11, 35mm SRD (and like Thomas, very shakey image , but this was on the ads and trailers as well as the feature)

90 minutes of junk. I don't mind some of Shymalan's other work (I'll spend all day defending 'The Village') but this was awfull.
At least it was an hour shorter than Speed Racer.

And I live in the UK where we get the edited version (so no woman sticked a rod in her neck and no tiger biting a guys arm off). But we do get all the terrible acting.
 

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Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 06-25-2008, 08:21 AM:
 
What?!? Jeez, man, you guys really know how to do the censorship thing! Chalk one up for Mary Whitehouse, God luv 'er. I thought things were looking up over there??
 

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Posted by Stu Jamieson (Member # 4626) on 06-28-2008, 07:21 AM:
 
Over the last 10 years it's seems I've often found myself in the role of M. Night Shyamalan's public defender against the detractors who doubt the man's film making talent. While it's certainly true that the quality of his films have been in steady decline from the brilliant pinnacle of The Sixth Sense to the somewhat shaky Lady In the Water, I've always maintained that Shyamalan's "bad" films are better than most other directors' good ones. It seems that with The Happening, however, I must concede defeat as this is a poor film by Shyamalan's standards and, at best, a very average film by any other standard.

After all his intriguing movies to date, with The Happening Shyamalan delivers a stock standard disaster flick and not a very good one at that. The solution to the crisis which afflicts this tale is provided by a crazy botanist about half an hour into the story. This theory is then pondered by our science teacher hero, Mark Wahlberg, for next hour who finally concludes (along with the scientific community at large) that the crazy man's theory was indeed correct. And herein lies the problem: the answer is given at the start of the film and the narrative fails to provide anything new from this point forward.

The films credibility is not helped by a supremely silly premise. But other movies have been made with more absurd premises than this and still worked; the trick is to make your ridiculous supposition believable on some level. Shyamalan's idea is unconvincing at the start and it still fails to convince by the end.

Shyamalan's characters are also unconvincing and his lack of character detail makes the relationships between them perplexing. We never learn enough about Wahlberg to trust that he knows what he's talking about and so when he lectures us on scientific principles, it feels like he's teaching us to suck eggs. Zooey Deschanel begins the film looking like a neurotic, whiny, simpleton but we soon learn that she is not so. So why is she portrayed this way to begin with? And apart from being a maths teacher, we have no idea who John Leguizamo is except that his character exists only to thrust an orphan into the story.

Placing the story's twist at the beginning of the narrative is certainly curious and provocative but it nullifies the point of having a twist. Maybe the real twist to this film is that Shyamalan, the renowned "Master of Twists", made a movie without one. But if this is so, he doesn't pull it off. Shyamalan may be good writer and director but he's clearly not that good!

5 out of 10
 

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Posted by Geena Phillips (Member # 3726) on 06-28-2008, 04:17 PM:
 
I feel for the guy, just because he's apparently so utterly without friends that he had not one person who could say to him, "Listen, M.? I'm not a film scholar or anything, but I'm pretty sure that an hour-and-a-half of people trying to outrun the fucking breeze is just not that visually arresting."
 

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Posted by David Stambaugh (Member # 1102) on 06-29-2008, 07:43 PM:
 
Well I saw about the first 30 minutes of The Happening today. Got an emergency page, had to leave. What I did see screamed "Student Film" to me. Like it was made by a film student with a real budget, or maybe like Mark Wahlberg agreed to appear in a student film for SAG minimum. Usually I am of the opinion that "bad acting" is not always the actors' fault because in general the actors give the performance the director wants (unless you're undirectable, like Marlon Brando in Apocalypse Now). But no! This movie does in fact contain a couple choice examples of bad acting. Either that or MNS was deliberately directing his actors to be bad. Even the opening credits were dumb. Clouds, lots of clouds. Oh, how creepy can you get. I have no doubt now that the entire movie is the way so many have already stated: Bad.

Regal 15 in Eugene, #11, 35mm. The digital preshow played with no audio. The 35mm image was very bouncy, not steady at all. Also one trailer played in analog, very VERY poor-sounding analog. The digital sound was good though.
 

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