"The Happening" (2008) - Movie Review

What to expect out of M. Night Shyamalan’s “The Happening”? In his films after “The Sixth Sense” he has not been able to sustain the wave he created in it. And he will not be able to because the occurrence of that film is not regular. Also people anticipate a stunning end like that which again is shortening his creativity. “Unbreakable” lived on the frequency of “The Sixth Sense” while “Signs” is something I had hard time grasping. “The Village” and “Lady in the Water” were both films I missed. I went to “The Happening” as I go for any regular films and it can be said that the film is a pleasant thriller and a horror film with unconventional approach in the current gory trend.

Being his first R-rated film, I had reservations on what blood bath Shyamalan has planned. Either the scale of gore I had in mind got elevated to make it look normal or the films now a day has tuned every one for gruesome images, I survived with couple of flinches. The north east of United States encounters a strange phenomenon of people affected by a neurotoxin suspected to be a terrorist attack. It disables their senses and allowing a window of it which is applied for killing themselves. The event spreads across and a science teacher Elliot Moore (Mark Wahlberg) is the character we begin to follow. He is a regular man with marital problems with his wife Alma (Zooey Deschanel). He tags on with his friend Julian (John Leguizamo). Julian has a daughter Jess (Ashlyn Sanchez). These are the people who will be the ones we would root for to survive this cataclysm by the nature.

“The Happening” works for lot of reasons. One such is the actors. It only takes couple of glances and stress in the dialogues to establish the friendship between Elliot and Julian along with the strong disliking opinion Julian has over Elma. In the situation of ultimate destruction, the humans are props for killing and one or many take the heroism potion. But “The Mist” handled it extremely well on the human horror existing in the society. Here it is the nature’s reaction to the zillions and zillions of human inhabitation and abuse of it. Shyamalan gives a horror film with an unconventional tone. He does not go for cheap shots of people killing each other in grisly manner. It would then be a zombie attack. He does not make strange things jump from nowhere or from a closed window. The fear he creates is a fear inhabited in common. In making the people suicidal, the terror is on the living ones. When the victims choose any form of tactics to choose their demise, they do not seem to feel the pain or at least their face is expressionless..

While it is effective, the film is not a great statement either. Mentioned earlier Shyamalan employs a novel style in giving a horror film with a human relationship at stake. He did the same in “Signs” which did not move the pace either as a thriller or as a drama. It got stuck in that zone of identity crisis failing to mingle the content properly. In “The Happening” the relationship trouble between Elliot and Alma has its moments of understanding and oddly a couple of comic timings in a fear looming picture.

We fathom and luxurious ourselves in the strong hope of nothing can happen in most circumstances and the truth is most often nothing happens. The tiniest possibility of the worst thing such as apocalyptic calamity has no place in our minds amongst the diurnal chores of hedonistic pleasure of routines. That is the reason world destruction comes as a block buster than a serious analysis of the effects. In that “The Happening” distinguishes a little bit.

Much credit goes to Wahlberg’s performance who manages to maintain the atmosphere of tension with a cool face. While the air is filled with fear, his ambidextrous ability of controlled deliverance at ease oscillates in between rare comic touches and terrifying runs. His Elliot does not become the almighty expertise hero to save the reducing clan but he is regular man who behaves as a regular man. And his deduction of this event is from his observation as a science teacher. This is a well composed role by him.

In theatres, I could hear most of the people sighing and a gentleman commenting that no wonder critics hated this during a scene of Wahlberg having a moment with a plant. It is quite impossible to go for a film without any expectation. The trick is to tone it down and ready to open up for what the film has to offer. The film obviously has the responsibility to fit the viewers in and guide them through where it wants to. The disappointed fans in most anticipated film often fall in to that iron curtain of disobeying to free them up. So I can understand what they would have wanted out of Shyamalan, one another “The Sixth Sense”.