Well, what do YOU think his intentions were? you haven't really delved much into the film's qualities other than the "shitty" acting and writing.

Surely an "unmitigated cinematic disaster" would be universally panned, yet KJ's poll above does not consist of all "F" grades...

Setting aside the anonymous grades, perhaps you could clarify which camp the KJer's who gave a positive rating (B- or better) in their signed reviews belong in - - rebels or crazies:

Munk-E
JURiNG
asalem182
french man
Jon
Jim Halpert
Rev
Bradley Witherberry
nghtvsn
trixster
Mr. X




(Personally, I believe that rebels and crazies are just as likely to give bad reviews/grades to a film like this...)

Yeah loyal it kind of bugs me how most of the time people who don't agree with your philosophy are written off in your book as "crazies."

A dull, boring shitshow of an excuse for a film. The acting was terrible, too. Usually Zooey is rreeaaaaallllyyy good, but she was the worst thing about the film acting-wise. I'd sooner suck the guy in frenchie's avatar's cock for 20 straight hours than see it again.

M. Night has become the worst director in the business. He won't be getting my money next time.


ZZZZZzzeeeeerrrrrrrrooooooo out of

Really?

Well she is quite the slut....

Ewww

I spoke to someone who saw and enjoyed The Happening yesterday, and she told me of an experience she had at the theatre that also happened to me while watching this film. Sitting near her were two giggly boys (i.e.:<30) who spent the entire movie making snide comments about it. She noted that it actually began before the movie started with things like "I can't wait to see how bad this really is", and continued with endless snark throughout. She said they seemed to come in primed to hate the movie with closed minds as to any other possibility. She's a lot more polite than I am and endured their snark for the whole performance, whereas I told the similar immature brats at my screening to STFU early on.

I believe this is an unfortunate phenomena of the internet age. Easily swayed weak-minded individuals that read tons of advance bad mouthing on the web from other similarily close-minded "individuals" (probably too strong a word for them) who also haven't yet seen the movie. I can imagine how this sense of false superiority might be enjoyable to those who usually go about their lives in awe of those around them capable of forming their own opinions, and don't usually consider it to be a problem except in the case of them disrupting the show I'm at, or endlessly attempting to dominate discussions with their dogmatism.

This is not to say that all people who dislike this film fall into that group. I can certainly see how the style of The Happening would not be to everyone's taste. There are going to be viewers who authentically hate and love this movie based on their unfiltered viewing of it.

But we are entering an age where this sort of anti-hype will compete with hype for the attention of the simple-minded. I understand the hype - - after all, that's just marketing. But this new trend towards anti-hype based on prejudice against certain actors and directors is different. It's the impotent response of the killjoy. It's a disease.

I liked Lady in the Water. Thought it could've turned out as a fantastic modern fairy tale, but it was just good.

The trailer for The Happening sucked. But when I went to watch the movie I hoped it will at least be good as Lady (now that's a movie people bash unfairly). The opening with the clouds was great. It had a feeling of unease and held promise that this could turn out to be another unfairly bashed Shyamalan movie. And then the opening scene in the park - AWESOME. And the workers on the building (in the trailer it looked a bit ridiculous, here in the movie context it was great) followed. But after then when Wahlberg stepped on scene the movie started to collapse, never recovering. So I genuinely don't like the movie for itself.

Pimple faced brats that act like that have been there even before the Internet.

Ummmm...............I thought this was bloody brilliant, guess im a crazy as well then

Yup.

Yaaaaay!

I do agree with Bradley that I feel as though people went in WANTING a disaster. I'll admit I went just to see how crappy it is, and it really didn't take long to realize that M. Night was in on the joke...most of the time. Enough of the time to make it awesome, anyway.

So I went to see this with my friend this afternoon. We were the only one's in the theater. I have not had this much fun watching a movie in quite sometime, and I don't mean because the film was so good. We both went in expecting to like it. But this is just a horrible film in every sense of the word. I'm honestly trying to think of a decent quality that this film had and I just can't come up with one. The only thing I can possibly think of is that M. Night is actually fucking with everyone. I mean that has to be it, right? Were we supposed to take any of this seriously? M. Night actually thought that the wind and plants could cause tension? Or is it supposed to be that everyone is killing themselves. I've got to be honest, I was expecting a little more gore here. Instead, this is a couple of trims here and there away from a PG-13 film. But even if M. Night is just simply fucking with everyone here, he has made an unbelievably dull and uninteresting motion picture - his first to date.

As everyone has mentioned, the acting across the board is terrible. The only one who I can't really pick on is the little girl because the only thing she is called on to do is cover her ears and look scared. She managed to pull that off effectively. Marky Mark on the other hand has a little rougher go of it, but I can't really put all of the blame on him. What the hell was M. Night thinking when he cast Wahlberg as a teacher? There are many times during the film where you just expect him to man up to the situation and take charge. He's not written that way though. I think this was the film Jeff Goldblum was born to be in. At the worst it would've been at least funnier. And I like Zooey Deschanel normally. Not here.

As for the gore, there's not enough of it. The only problem though is that when there is some, it just comes across as being funny. In trying to come up with different ways to kill people, M. Night is creatively bankrupt.

And try as he might, James Netwon Howard couldn't bring any tension to the film. As much as he wanted to get those violins going to try and create some suspense, he just couldn't do it all by himself. Instead, the music comes off as incredibly cheesy.

Horrible

½* - Because there is at least some effort here, unlike Spartans and College Road Trip.

Certainly not all of it, and that's where people are mistaken about it.

Just most of it.

Not even most of it.

Scenes like the plastic plant and Elliot's pharmacy story are not unintentional hilarity, they're totally intentional. It's part of the overall tone of the film.

Agreed. I actually liked the scene with the plant. But even if it fits in with the overall tone of the film, I couldn't care less. I get that Night was trying to have some fun here, but he's really the only one having any.

I love how Shyamalan's work was so bad here that a lot of people have convinced themselves that that's what he was going for.

The cough medicine and the fake plant were undoubtedly two scenes of intentional humor; I disregard anyone's opinion on this film who claims otherwise.

Well yes. Actually...I'm not so sure about the fake plant. The point at which he realized it was fake, sure...but before that, when he was just scared of the plant in the room...that's totally straigh-out-of-Signs Shyamalan type horror.

Absolutely, it was pretty clear that those were intentionally funny, and it worked for me. The rest of the film however, didn't.

Puh-lease. From the moment that Wahlberg looks funny at the tree to when he's STILL TALKING when he realizes it's fake, it was suppose to be funny. Stupid-funny, but funny nonetheless.

I would also say that at least all of the "happenings" were suppose to have an undertone of camp to them. From the banal dialogue that precedes it, to the sheer ridiculousness of some of these suicides (The lawn mower, the passing of the gun), that I'm almost certain M. Night was grinning like a little kid behind the camera in most of these scenes, just like I was.