BOTTOM LINE: M. Night Shayamalan regains his directorial feet a little bit with this cautionary tale of the environment turning on humans, but at the end of the day this film confirms he's a one-trick pony with an extremely narrow vision who can't seem to get past his ego by letting someone else write better scripts for him or to get even half-decent performances from his cast.
THE GOOD: We're living in a world that has become acutely aware of issues such as global warming and greenhouse gas emissions. With "The Happening", the latest offering from M. Night Shyamalan, who manages to right his directorial ship a little bit in this film after some truly woeful films, puts forward the concept of the environment starting to attack humans for the way we've all treated it. Fantastic idea, particularly with the notion that the plants start releasing a chemical which affects the neurological impulses in human brains, causing them to harm themselves. Quite a number of scenes in this film are very chilling; in the opening scenes in New York a group of workers having a break on a construction site see they're co-workers walking off the top of the construction site to their deaths on the street. Or there's the image of people hanging dead from trees when a group of characters drive through a deserted town. Very eerie and disturbing (this is Night's first non-PG feature). Aside from the obvious environmental themes, there's also some exploration of human behaviour and the way we treat each other in a crisis (echoing scenes from Spielberg's War Of The Worlds). The film scores points for its topical themes and warnings, as well as Shyamalan's ability to make the environmental world come alive and feel threatening, like a predator hunting its prey in the humans.
THE BAD: Where do you begin? Shyamalan clearly has some talent as director because even in his worst films you can see little flashes of brilliance here and there, but the problem is he just can't seem to get over his own self-importance. As a result, this film, just like his last few films, has a brilliant concept but a screenplay and plot that just meanders from one point to the next without any real structure (hint Night, get a script writer). There are a number of scenes in this film that just don't go anywhere or amount to anything; take Alma's (Zooey Deschanel) secret which turns out to be she went for dessert with a guy at the office without telling Elliot (Mark Wahlberg). His response is to make a sarcastic story about how he deliberately bought cough medicine for no reason so he could talk to a cute pharmacist. It's dreadful and given the apocalyptic nature of the story it's completely out of place. Then there's the whole sequence with the old mad loner at the end. The idea of someone shutting themselves off to the world to be with nature works well in the frame work of the idea, but the delivery is absolutely terrible, particularly as she ends up as one of the victims. The performances across the board are absolutely terrible, and not because the cast selected were bad. It's all Shyamalan's misguided (I'm being polite here) direction. Marky Mark Wahlberg can be good with the right director but this is hands down one of the most embarrassing performances you're likely to see, largely due to the high-pitched whiney tone he takes and the woeful dialogue he's given to deliver. Zooey Deschanel doesn't fare much better, looking like a deer in headlights for most of the film. Then there's the title, "The Happening". I don't think 'happening' is a noun, and it makes for some very gimmicky dialogue, like "is this really happening?" Oh my God!!!! In the end, this film is an embarrassing mess. Maybe not as bad as his previous two efforts, but it's a mess any way, begging the question whether or not Shyamalan really has the humility and self-awareness to listen to others, and by extension, to have what it takes to be a great director. Oh well, at least in this film he doesn't inflict on us a pathetic twist ending to make him look like a clever screenwriter.
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