The Happening

The Happening

I need to just get this out of the way up front. The Happening is the single worst film I’ve seen since Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen. If your morbid curiosity has gotten the better of you then by all means read on, but if you’re content in the knowledge that it’s a piece of shit? Please feel free to stop reading now.

Now for all you sick sick ladies and gentlemen who just can’t help yourself and must read on!

You’re probably asking yourself what exactly “the happening” is? The best I can tell is it’s some kind of biological attack on humanity performed by the single most abundant terror cell in the world, PLANTS! Yup, that’s the big mystery, the whole thing was perpetrated by plants. WHAT A TWIST! It actually gets Marky Mark so paranoid that he winds up talking to plants and the best part is that it was PLASTIC PLANT!

Her Marky, picking up any "good vibrations"?

The story follows Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel as they travel away from the big city in an attempt to get away from what they initially believe to be terrorist attacks. Soon enough they begin to see what it really is and it becomes a struggle just to stay alive. Along the way there are about 700 suicides (which seems like it was the main selling point in the ad campaign). I don’t know about you, but I’m not a big fan of watching people off themselves in more and more gruesome ways. The only real pleasure the film seems to deliver is twofold; on one side we get to see John leguizamo perform one line so brilliantly it almost makes up for the pest “Don’t take my daughter’s hand unless you mean it!” and ultimately we get to watch him off himself, again almost making up for the pest!

A better name for this film would be "the look up" that's 90% of the flick right here!

As we follow Marky (you don’t mind if we call you Marky, right?) we watch his group grow and dwindle as they run into new people and they eventually off themselves. Eventually it dwindles down to just Marky, Zooey and John Leguizamo’s daughter and they happen upon a nice little house completely off the grid. Of course you know there’s a problem with the house! A complete nutter of an old hag owns the house. She doesn’t really want to help them, but relents and eventually offs herself (big fucking surprise right?). In the end everything just stops and it’s over. This begs the question, why couldn’t the fucking movie end like that? Everything seems to be going swell for the new family and then they have to ruin all the fun by showing that all this is happening again in France, but who friggin cares about them frogs!

Tres Chic!

Mark Wahlberg is easily one of the worst actors in the business and his performance in the happening just proves that he deserves to be driven out of Hollywood (preferably to never be seen again). Zooey Deschanel, on the other hand, should know better! I’ve decided to give M. Knight one more chance with the last airbender (which is so upsetting that it couldn’t have been called Avatar!), but I’m not holding my breath! There are feeble attempts at humor, even more feeble attempts at drama, but the worst offenders are when they try to do suspense/horror. There’s just not that much frightening about plants, sorry M. Knight, but there isn’t. Maybe next time you can make a film about vampires and werewolves in love with a human girl…oh wait.

OH NOES, DA PLANTZ!

1 out of 10