There are some creepy moments but overall The Happening is a bit of a non-event.
Comment
06/20/08
The Happening (2008)
19 %
Tomatometer
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Reviews Counted: 167
Fresh: 31
Rotten:136
Average Rating: 4.1/10
Consensus: The Happening begins with promise, but unfortunately descends into an incoherent and unconvincing trifle.
Runtime: 1 hr 31 mins
Genre: Action/Adventure
US Box Office: $64,384,941
Synopsis: M. Night Shyamalan directs this thriller about a science teacher (Mark Wahlberg) who tries to escape with his wife and friend's daughter after an apocalyptic event. THE HAPPENING costars Zooey... [More]
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel, John Leguizamo, Betty Buckley
Director: M. Night Shyamalan
Reviews for The Happening
Top CriticAnother disappointment from M, despite some disturbing violence and chilly moments.
06/13/08
Top CriticThe movie is a bummer, from beginning to end.
06/13/08
Top CriticA tantalising, sometimes frustrating parable about the menaces that human beings might face from unexpected quarters.
06/13/08
Top CriticMaybe Shyamalan has been plugged into those other worlds for too long. Judging from what is on offer here, he needs to become more acquainted with the emotional language of this one.
06/13/08
Top CriticWhile hardly his worst work, this film is so far off his high water mark that it begs the question of whether M. Night Shyamalan will ever truly return.
06/13/08
Top CriticExcluding moments of chilling effectiveness, this could fairly be called his worst film. Even his saving grace of keen directorial acumen visibly loses cohesion on screen.
06/12/08
Top CriticSadly for Mr. Shyamalan, the ideas that have been coming to him since his brilliant first hit The Sixth Sense are progressively worthy of less merit and more deserving of ridicule.
06/10/08
Top CriticSeeing The Happening is like going on an outing with an earnest person, who happens to be a drunk. Every time it starts to make sense, it slurs its speech and starts dropping things -- such as coherence and credibility.
02/01/09
More than anything, what bothers me about it is a sense of cheapness that ... centrally comes from a concept mainly built for shock value.
11/14/08
Undoubtedly M. Night Shyamalan's weakest thriller to date...
11/06/08
While not as laughable as the narcissistic Lady in the Water ,it fails just as miserably as narrative and even more miserably with its flat characters and tone deaf dialogue.
10/12/08
[A]n astonishment, so idiotic in conception and inept in execution that, after seeing it, one almost wonders whether it was real or imagined.
09/22/08
It's a great idea. A silent, unknown killing machine knocking people off while a science teacher tries to figure out why. But it just didn't work.
08/27/08
Shyamalan's latest is an improvement, but a full-fledged comeback ain't happening.
08/08/08
Shyamalan is a master at a visual iconic moment - but the "filler" (you might have learned about it in English class by this name: "story") gets weaker and weaker every film.
07/17/08
The M. Knight brilliance is there in quick jolts of suspense and terror, but those moments are the exception in this otherwise flat little thriller.
07/11/08
Shyamalan's religious ideas are a lot like Bush's: Nearly theology free.
07/10/08
M. Night Shyamalan offers up low-intensity thrills that fail to match the shivery shudders of his best work (THE SIXTH SENSE, SIGNS). His patented approach - mixing domestic drama with horror - plays out on a much larger canvas.
07/04/08
It is the first film of his career that feels incompetent and utterly gratuitous at times.
07/03/08
Latest News for The Happening
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June 16, 2008:
WNYC RADIO: A numbing polemical morality tale in dreary doomsday thriller clothing, this dull downer for all its mass panic attack high alert mode, may be more effective in unintentionally boring people to death. 
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