Author Topic: The Happening  (Read 15854 times)

Darwinist

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on: June 11, 2008, 01:26:36 PM
Is anyone pumped to see M. Night's latest movie "The Happening" which opens this Friday, the 13th?   The trailer looks pretty disturbing. 

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


eytanz

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Reply #1 on: June 11, 2008, 01:54:58 PM
All of Shamalayan's post-Unbreakable movies have been mediocre at best, unwatchable at worst. I'll just look for spoilers online so I know the twist and save the two hours of my life getting there.



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Reply #2 on: June 11, 2008, 02:51:19 PM
All of Shamalayan's post-Unbreakable movies have been mediocre at best, unwatchable at worst. I'll just look for spoilers online so I know the twist and save the two hours of my life getting there.

Signs was shit; apart from that and Unbreakable (itself not bad but definitely overrated) I haven't watched any other Shyamalan movies.

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eytanz

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Reply #3 on: June 11, 2008, 02:57:20 PM
All of Shamalayan's post-Unbreakable movies have been mediocre at best, unwatchable at worst. I'll just look for spoilers online so I know the twist and save the two hours of my life getting there.

Signs was shit; apart from that and Unbreakable (itself not bad but definitely overrated) I haven't watched any other Shyamalan movies.

I adored Sixth Sense - I still do, though I'm sick of hearing about it - but then I watched it unspoiled (and figured out the twist about 2 minutes before the reveal, which is the best time to do so). It is overhyped, and I think it'd be totally unwatchable now based on the level of cultural saturation it achieved, but back when it came out it was a really good movie.



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Reply #4 on: June 11, 2008, 03:07:39 PM
Signs was shit; apart from that and Unbreakable (itself not bad but definitely overrated) I haven't watched any other Shyamalan movies.

I adored Sixth Sense - I still do, though I'm sick of hearing about it - but then I watched it unspoiled (and figured out the twist about 2 minutes before the reveal, which is the best time to do so). It is overhyped, and I think it'd be totally unwatchable now based on the level of cultural saturation it achieved, but back when it came out it was a really good movie.

doh!  I forgot about The Sixth Sense, which was good.  My brother and I were taken by surprise; we were railing about how crap the movie was at the point that we thought was the end (the kid is apparently now well-adjusted and there's nothing more for Bruce to do) and then the twist was sprung on us.

Okay, that's two decent movies and one absolutely shit one.  I'm not eager to check out more of Shyamalan's work given what I've heard about The Village and the rest of his films.

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Reply #5 on: June 11, 2008, 03:55:04 PM
I will say I'm curious about it.  I don't hate Shamalayan, but I've certainly been disappointed by some of what he's done lately.  I never actually saw Lady in the Water, but I was curious about that one, too, because it seemed like maybe he was trying to do something new.  But then his ego exploded even more and he wrote that book comparing himself to Michael Jordan and others, and I just couldn't care. 

Still, I really did like Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and I think the previews for the Happening have some very spooky images in them, particularly the people falling off the roof. 

That said, word of mouth hasn't been good thus far, so color me curious but skeptical  ;)


Darwinist

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Reply #6 on: June 11, 2008, 06:29:16 PM

Still, I really did like Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and I think the previews for the Happening have some very spooky images in them, particularly the people falling off the roof. 

That said, word of mouth hasn't been good thus far, so color me curious but skeptical  ;)

Same here. I'm one of the 7 people that liked The Village but never saw Lady in the Water. I'm planning on seeing The Happening this weekend, I hope he can come up with something as good as his first two movies.  Even though his last few movies have been considered to be duds, he still gets some of the bigger named actors.

Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


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Reply #7 on: June 11, 2008, 06:45:07 PM
Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

So that means it will have bewbs in it?  :)

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Reply #8 on: June 11, 2008, 07:58:22 PM
Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

So that means it will have bewbs in it?  :)

Or more than one instance of the word "fuck".

FWIW, I did NOT see the Sixth Sense twist coming, though on second viewing, the "everyone who's dead has a lock of gray hair" angle was noticed by me.  I didn't see the Unbreakable twist coming either, and I loved that.  Signs was not so grate akshuly, and I do want to see Lady in the Water, but haven't yet.

I think when SS and U were in theaters, I wasn't as entrenched in the general SF/F/H scene as I am now, so I wasn't actively LOOKING for the twist ending.  Nowadays, I always am.

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Reply #9 on: June 11, 2008, 08:32:13 PM

Still, I really did like Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and I think the previews for the Happening have some very spooky images in them, particularly the people falling off the roof. 

That said, word of mouth hasn't been good thus far, so color me curious but skeptical  ;)

Same here. I'm one of the 7 people that liked The Village but never saw Lady in the Water. I'm planning on seeing The Happening this weekend, I hope he can come up with something as good as his first two movies.  Even though his last few movies have been considered to be duds, he still gets some of the bigger named actors.

Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

I kind of liked the Village, too.  Although, when somebody mentioned that the movie hinged on the director literally sitting down in front of the camera and explaining the twist, I liked it considerably less so, because it's very accurate.  Still, I thought the idea was interesting, and it was far from a terrible movie.  Honestly, I think that's his biggest problem: that Shamalayan is his own worst enemy and he'll always be compared against himself -- mostly against The Sixth Sense.

I think it's silly that the big marketing push is that this is his first R-rated film.  That makes me not want to see it.  It's like pushing the so-called "unrated" cuts on DVD.  There's very little added. 


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Reply #10 on: June 12, 2008, 01:55:30 AM
Meh, I'm not Shamalayn's biggest fan, but he's certainly a talented filmmaker. All his movies have at least good cinemetography going for it.

I'm hoping The Happening is just as good as Unbreakable and Lady in the Water.



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Reply #11 on: June 13, 2008, 04:26:41 PM
This, unfortunately, is not a promising review.


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Reply #12 on: June 13, 2008, 06:14:54 PM
I've been joking about it, but Tom Braselton from Theater Hopper has posted a review of The Happening as well.  He references "two swears and Zooey Deschanel's cleavage".

http://theaterhopper.com/index.php?date=20080613

I love Zooey Deschanel, but if the movie is as bad as everyone says it is, I'll wait for the DVD.

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Reply #13 on: June 13, 2008, 08:49:02 PM
Yet another Shamalamadingdong film that I'll be giving a miss, then.  :-\

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Darwinist

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Reply #14 on: June 13, 2008, 09:31:41 PM
This, unfortunately, is not a promising review.

Ouch.  Most of the national reviews I've read on rottentomatoes.com have been negative also. 

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


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Reply #15 on: June 13, 2008, 09:47:09 PM

Still, I really did like Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and I think the previews for the Happening have some very spooky images in them, particularly the people falling off the roof. 

That said, word of mouth hasn't been good thus far, so color me curious but skeptical  ;)

Same here. I'm one of the 7 people that liked The Village but never saw Lady in the Water. I'm planning on seeing The Happening this weekend, I hope he can come up with something as good as his first two movies.  Even though his last few movies have been considered to be duds, he still gets some of the bigger named actors.

Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

I kind of liked the Village, too.  Although, when somebody mentioned that the movie hinged on the director literally sitting down in front of the camera and explaining the twist, I liked it considerably less so, because it's very accurate.  Still, I thought the idea was interesting, and it was far from a terrible movie.  Honestly, I think that's his biggest problem: that Shamalayan is his own worst enemy and he'll always be compared against himself -- mostly against The Sixth Sense.

I think it's silly that the big marketing push is that this is his first R-rated film.  That makes me not want to see it.  It's like pushing the so-called "unrated" cuts on DVD.  There's very little added. 


Me too!  Nearly ten of us now!  The Village, for me, is redeemed almost completely by three things:

-Joaquin Phoenix
-The astounding performance Bryce Dallas Howard turns in.
-The final scene between Sigourney Weaver and William Hurt.

Looking forward to The Happening too.



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Reply #16 on: June 13, 2008, 09:48:48 PM
I did like that I thought Joaquin Phoenix was going to be the hero of the story and then...wasn't. 

Yeah, the acting in Village (and his other films) is not something I'm too critical of. 


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Reply #17 on: June 13, 2008, 11:40:59 PM

Still, I really did like Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and I think the previews for the Happening have some very spooky images in them, particularly the people falling off the roof. 

That said, word of mouth hasn't been good thus far, so color me curious but skeptical  ;)

Same here. I'm one of the 7 people that liked The Village but never saw Lady in the Water. I'm planning on seeing The Happening this weekend, I hope he can come up with something as good as his first two movies.  Even though his last few movies have been considered to be duds, he still gets some of the bigger named actors.

Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

I kind of liked the Village, too.  Although, when somebody mentioned that the movie hinged on the director literally sitting down in front of the camera and explaining the twist, I liked it considerably less so, because it's very accurate.  Still, I thought the idea was interesting, and it was far from a terrible movie.  Honestly, I think that's his biggest problem: that Shamalayan is his own worst enemy and he'll always be compared against himself -- mostly against The Sixth Sense.

I think it's silly that the big marketing push is that this is his first R-rated film.  That makes me not want to see it.  It's like pushing the so-called "unrated" cuts on DVD.  There's very little added. 


Me too!  Nearly ten of us now!  The Village, for me, is redeemed almost completely by three things:

-Joaquin Phoenix
-The astounding performance Bryce Dallas Howard turns in.
-The final scene between Sigourney Weaver and William Hurt.

Looking forward to The Happening too.
I have to agree.  I enjoyed The Village also.  I even knew the twist before I saw the film and I still liked it, which speaks volumes for the film.  I think Shyamalayan's movies are a lot like the old Twilight Zone episodes.  The twist at the end is the real hook.

Signs was shit though.  SPOLIER ALERT:  Let's see...alien race capable of interstellar travel doesn't do enough research to find out the planet they are invading is covered in 70% ACID (or equivalent to them).  Oh, and there is acid vapor in the atmosphere and it rains acid.  Plus, all the inhabitants of this planet bleed acid, spit acid, and piss acid.  Don't forget about the acid condensation that forms on everything overnight in most temperate and tropical climates.  I would love to be a fly on the wall when the coordinator of that invasion explains why he failed to his boss...

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Reply #18 on: June 14, 2008, 05:48:13 AM
HAHAHAHAHA.  yea i saw Signs on a bus ride to somewhere on one of my middle school class trips.  it did not scare me in the least, it rather bored me to death.
the happening looks pretty stupid.  OMG THEY ARE DYING AND WE DON'T KNOW WHY!!!! :O
doesn't do it for me.

I'd like to hear my options, so I could weigh them, what do you say?
Five pounds?  Six pounds? Seven pounds?


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Reply #19 on: June 14, 2008, 01:41:01 PM
Yeah despite some nice tension-building in Signs, I remember being completely flabbergasted that the aliens were using humans for food even though they were deathly allergic (or whatever) to water. 


Darwinist

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Reply #20 on: June 14, 2008, 07:48:59 PM
Yeah despite some nice tension-building in Signs, I remember being completely flabbergasted that the aliens were using humans for food even though they were deathly allergic (or whatever) to water. 

They must have spent a lot of time processing the meat. 

There were a few scenes that I liked in Signs.  I liked the "shocking footage" where the alien appeared briefly on the TV and the scene where Mel is out in the cornfield and drops his flashlight.   

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


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Reply #21 on: June 15, 2008, 06:44:08 PM

Still, I really did like Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and I think the previews for the Happening have some very spooky images in them, particularly the people falling off the roof. 

That said, word of mouth hasn't been good thus far, so color me curious but skeptical  ;)

Same here. I'm one of the 7 people that liked The Village but never saw Lady in the Water. I'm planning on seeing The Happening this weekend, I hope he can come up with something as good as his first two movies.  Even though his last few movies have been considered to be duds, he still gets some of the bigger named actors.

Also, I love how the trailers on TV loudly proclaim that The Happening "is his first R-rated movie".  Whoopie!   

I kind of liked the Village, too.  Although, when somebody mentioned that the movie hinged on the director literally sitting down in front of the camera and explaining the twist, I liked it considerably less so, because it's very accurate.  Still, I thought the idea was interesting, and it was far from a terrible movie.  Honestly, I think that's his biggest problem: that Shamalayan is his own worst enemy and he'll always be compared against himself -- mostly against The Sixth Sense.

I think it's silly that the big marketing push is that this is his first R-rated film.  That makes me not want to see it.  It's like pushing the so-called "unrated" cuts on DVD.  There's very little added. 


Me too!  Nearly ten of us now!  The Village, for me, is redeemed almost completely by three things:

-Joaquin Phoenix
-The astounding performance Bryce Dallas Howard turns in.
-The final scene between Sigourney Weaver and William Hurt.

Looking forward to The Happening too.
I have to agree.  I enjoyed The Village also.  I even knew the twist before I saw the film and I still liked it, which speaks volumes for the film.  I think Shyamalayan's movies are a lot like the old Twilight Zone episodes.  The twist at the end is the real hook.

Signs was shit though.  SPOLIER ALERT:  Let's see...alien race capable of interstellar travel doesn't do enough research to find out the planet they are invading is covered in 70% ACID (or equivalent to them).  Oh, and there is acid vapor in the atmosphere and it rains acid.  Plus, all the inhabitants of this planet bleed acid, spit acid, and piss acid.  Don't forget about the acid condensation that forms on everything overnight in most temperate and tropical climates.  I would love to be a fly on the wall when the coordinator of that invasion explains why he failed to his boss...

I also liked The Village.  That may have a lot to do with how I saw it.  I watched it on cable, because the other movies were guaranteed shit.  I saw it had a couple name actors, so I figured I'd give it a shot.  I knew nothing about it and only found out it was from M Night after the movie was over.

Signs I was into until it did turn out to be aliens.  The whole crop circles from aliens thing was always stupid as shit.  Any aliens planning to come down here would figure out our GPS system and use that far before anything else terrestrial.  They would probably just be more comfortable with their own tech and we'd never know what they were using. 

The whole water thing was just stupid.



Darwinist

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Reply #22 on: June 16, 2008, 11:41:22 AM
I hit "The Happening" this weekend.  Going in, I wanted to like it but I have to give it a "meh".   Maybe a C- if I had to score it.   I guess it was rated "R" because of the gruesome, in your face violence.   I'm kind of sorry to see M. Night go that route.  Hitchcock scared the crap out of us without having to show people getting their arms ripped off.  Anyway, I thought some of the suicide scenes were so ridiculous they were laughable, and that took away from the horror I was supposed to feel.  There were some other things that bugged me too but I don't have time to write much right now.  I bought to what caused The Happening and thought the way it was presented was kind of cool, even with the rushed explanations of the talking heads towards the end.  But I left the theater thinking that M. Night made another mediocre film and I will tell friends and anyone at work that asks me about the movie to wait for it on DVD if you want to watch it.   

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


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Reply #23 on: June 16, 2008, 11:56:09 AM
I hit "The Happening" this weekend.  Going in, I wanted to like it but I have to give it a "meh".   Maybe a C- if I had to score it.   I guess it was rated "R" because of the gruesome, in your face violence.   I'm kind of sorry to see M. Night go that route.  Hitchcock scared the crap out of us without having to show people getting their arms ripped off.  Anyway, I thought some of the suicide scenes were so ridiculous they were laughable, and that took away from the horror I was supposed to feel.  There were some other things that bugged me too but I don't have time to write much right now.  I bought to what caused The Happening and thought the way it was presented was kind of cool, even with the rushed explanations of the talking heads towards the end.  But I left the theater thinking that M. Night made another mediocre film and I will tell friends and anyone at work that asks me about the movie to wait for it on DVD if you want to watch it.   

Interestingly we got very definite cuts AWAY from most of the violence.  Seriously, there was more overt stuff in the trailer than the English cut.

I liked it but then, I liked Signs, which in a lot of ways this is the scientific flip side of.  Where Signs has it's characters understanding what's going on through their faith, here there's one specific moment where Elliot explicitly stops and THINKS about what's happening and I really liked that.
   Also, and this is something that a lot of the reviewers over here just aren't getting, it's a 1950's SF movie.  The entire grammar of the piece, from the time codes and shifting locations to the slightly stilted delivery of the leads (I was alternately intrigued and irritated by the fact they were both cold fish) to the arrival of 'Doctor Explains The Plot' at the end is all pure '50s end of the world SF.

   Don't get me wrong, I agree it's a REALLY long way from his best work.  But it's a definite step up from Lady in the Water, at least for me.



Darwinist

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Reply #24 on: June 16, 2008, 01:46:07 PM
   Also, and this is something that a lot of the reviewers over here just aren't getting, it's a 1950's SF movie.  The entire grammar of the piece, from the time codes and shifting locations to the slightly stilted delivery of the leads (I was alternately intrigued and irritated by the fact they were both cold fish) to the arrival of 'Doctor Explains The Plot' at the end is all pure '50s end of the world SF.

I liked that about the movie - especially the excited scientist at the end that was passionately speaking about his theories.  And the final scene I really liked, too.  One thing I didn't get was the odd relationship with the Leguizamo charachter and the Zooey character - I think I missed something there.  He made the comment about Zooey holding his daughter's hand and it was this dramatic moment in the movie and it went right over my head.   

 

 

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


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Reply #25 on: June 16, 2008, 02:39:09 PM
I hit "The Happening" this weekend.  Going in, I wanted to like it but I have to give it a "meh".   Maybe a C- if I had to score it.   I guess it was rated "R" because of the gruesome, in your face violence.   

So, no bewbz then?   :(

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Darwinist

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Reply #26 on: June 16, 2008, 04:09:15 PM
I hit "The Happening" this weekend.  Going in, I wanted to like it but I have to give it a "meh".   Maybe a C- if I had to score it.   I guess it was rated "R" because of the gruesome, in your face violence.   

So, no bewbz then?   :(

No, just a lot of close up of Zooey's face and her blue eyes, which looked as big as baseballs. 

For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion, however satisfying and reassuring.    -  Carl Sagan


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Reply #27 on: June 17, 2008, 02:06:58 AM
I'm a big M Night fan. He can always get a clever twist out of a movie, and can conceive some great camera angles and such. We went to see The Happening this weekend, too. I felt it was extremely creepy. Certainly more than I expected it to be.



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Reply #28 on: August 01, 2008, 12:48:19 PM
I've seen three Shamalang movies so far:

The Sixth Sense - I won't say I figured out what the twist was, simply because until the big reveal I didn't realise that it was supposed to be a twist. It starts off with Bruce Willis getting shot in the chest, and then after that, no-one whose alive ever notices that he's there, except for a kid who talks to dead people. I just kind of assumed it was meant to be obvious that he was a ghost from the start. It's like if The Terminator ended with the breathless reveal that Arnie is actually a robot! It turns out that this is a pretty boring movie, if there's no twist in it.

Unbreakable - I have to say, I loved this one. I've always been a sucker for a good superhero movie, and this is a good one. I'm not a huge fan of the Mr Glass twist, but it didn't spoil anything for me.

Signs - The biggest cinematic turd anyone ever shat out onto the silver screen. What Chodon said about the aliens. Plus, nothing the humans did made sense, either.

After that, I've never heard anything about any of his later movies that makes me want to spend the time and money to see them. And I doubt I'm going to bother seeing The Happening.

Science means that not all dreams can come true