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Topic: The Happening

Mike Schindler
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1039
From: Oak Park, IL, USA
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 06-13-2008 02:44 PM

M. Night Shyamalan needs to just stop making movies.

If he must make movies, he should do a romantic comedy, or musical, or something that doesn't involve wide-angle closeups of people with expressions of shock on their faces.

This thing looks and feels like it was written and directed by a first-year film student. It's laughably bad.

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Dan Lyons
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 698
From: Seal Beach, CA
Registered: Sep 2002

posted 06-13-2008 04:43 PM

watched this crap last night.

Total garbage.

OMG! The plants and trees are getting revenge on humans!! [puke]

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Michael Barry
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 584
From: Sydney, NSW, Australia
Registered: Nov 1999

posted 06-14-2008 02:29 AM

I saw the 1:15am(!) session at the AMC Empire 25 at Times Square. It was the only show not yet sold out. The print was interlocked with the cinema next door and both sessions were sold out. Every session for this movie at this location sold out tonight, despite having a digital print and what seemed like 4 X 35MM prints (and at least one interlock). Being from Sydney, this is somewhat outside my reality. Freaky!

Count me in as someone who enjoyed it! I liked it more than almost all his other movies.

I was invested the whole way through; the movie felt more even throughout than his other films (to me). There are some stunning sequences and the whole thing just mesmerised me.

I'm probably alone on this; the packed house I saw it with didn't react very well to the ending at all...but the optimist in me hopes that word of mouth is pretty good anyway and that it will end up doing well nonetheless.

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Scott McGuire
Film Handler

Posts: 94
From: Elmira, NY/United States
Registered: Oct 2007

posted 06-14-2008 05:57 PM

I agree garbage. If i wasn't screeing it i'm pretty sure i would have walked out.

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Michael Gonzalez
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 790
From: Grand Island , NE USA
Registered: Sep 2000

posted 06-14-2008 08:08 PM

Bummer. I had actually been looking forward to seeing this after seeing the trailer.

Has there ever been any other director or film maker who can continue to pack houses baised on their notoriety over one great film. It seems that everyone goes to see his movies hoping that it will be as good but it doesnt look like that will ever happen.

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Allison Parsons
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 630
From: East Peoria, IL
Registered: Oct 2004

posted 06-15-2008 02:07 AM

Saw it tonight. Honestly, I didn't hate it. I loved the premise, but it did seem like he kind of half-assed the movie, or just didn't give it his all.

The biggest complaint that I had throughout the movie was THE ACTING WAS HORRIBLE! Just horrid.

quote:
OMG! The plants and trees are getting revenge on humans!!

Let me guess, you hated The Invasion of the Body Snatchers too [Big Grin]

2.5 out of 5 stars.

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Kurt Zupin
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 989
From: Maricopa, Arizona
Registered: Oct 2004

posted 06-15-2008 04:12 AM

This film was horrible, it flat out sucked. The acting is horrible, the movie looks like it was shot for CBS. Looks like a made for tv movie. Oh and they are running from FUCKING wind!!

0/5 [thumbsup]

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Frank Angel
Film God

Posts: 5305
From: Brooklyn NY USA
Registered: Dec 1999

posted 06-15-2008 04:35 AM

quote: Kurt Zupin
This film was horrible, it flat out sucked. The acting is horrible, the movie looks like it was shot for CBS. Looks like a made for tv movie.

Seems like this is the consensus, but then how do you account for this?:

quote: Michael Barry
I saw the 1:15am(!) session at the AMC Empire 25 at Times Square. It was the only show not yet sold out. The print was interlocked with the cinema next door and both sessions were sold out. Every session for this movie at this location sold out tonight, despite having a digital print and what seemed like 4 X 35MM prints

And like Michael, I too had been looking forward to it opening. The reason there are sold out screenings and the need to interlock multiple screens is simple....it means that this was one hellofa KNOCKOUT of a trailer -- an example of really superb marketing. The trailer looked awesome to me.

That's the only reason why it has such a strong opening and maybe just a tad to do with the M. Night Shyamalan following, but I wouldn't count that as the main draw.

If it weren't for these posts, I was just about ready to plunk down my $12 to see it. Now I don't even know if I will netflix it when it comes out. And if you guys are right about it, those patrons at the AMC will run screaming to tell their friends what a dog turd it is and it will drop off the radar fast. Netflicks will have it in a coupla weeks.

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Kurt Zupin
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 989
From: Maricopa, Arizona
Registered: Oct 2004

posted 06-15-2008 07:42 AM

The same reason I can account for the fact we had to ineterlock on Friday night. We had it on 4 screens Friday night and it was packing them in, even the midnight. Everyone came running thinking it would be this greta M Night movie. Guess what the word coming out of the theatres was...ummm wow that sucked, did we really just pay for that? Guess what happened tonight? We didn't interlock or even sell out, HULK did great. But Happening sure wasn't Happening tongiht.

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Tom Mundell
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 120
From: Silver Spring, MD, USA
Registered: Nov 2007

posted 06-15-2008 08:21 AM

drat, I was looking forward to this too...so far at Rotten Tomatoes it's got a 20% on the tomato meter...not too promising...

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Mike Schindler
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1039
From: Oak Park, IL, USA
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 06-15-2008 09:51 AM

quote:
-- an example of really superb marketing.

Ok, I kinda see what you're saying, but let's keep in mind that the tagline was, "We Sensed it. We saw the Signs. Now... It's Happening." That's just a little too dumb.

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Mark Ogden
Jedi Master Film Handler

Posts: 943
From: Little Falls, N.J.
Registered: Jun 99

posted 06-15-2008 11:36 AM

quote: Tom Mundell
drat, I was looking forward to this too...so far at Rotten Tomatoes it's got a 20% on the tomato meter...not too promising...

So ignore Rotten Tomatoes and the other posts and go make up your own mind. That's what I did, and I wound up enjoying it quite a bit. I thought the first ten or fifteen minutes was some of the most unnerving stuff I've ever seen. I also enjoyed The Village and Lady in the Water. Say what you want, but the guy certainly has his own vision. I'd rather see one of his pictures than any three boring derivative Marvel comic book adaptations.

His problem is that he hit paydirt with only his third film, The Sixth Sense. That brought out the knives among the nation's film critics, many of whom love to savage a success story (a typical intentionally snide bullshit review I heard yesterday: "The Happening is about a sudden wave of mass suicide, which is what movie-goers will feel like doing after they see the film!" Boy, there's some clever, objective criticism).

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Mike Schindler
Phenomenal Film Handler

Posts: 1039
From: Oak Park, IL, USA
Registered: Jun 2002

posted 06-15-2008 11:57 AM

quote: Mark Ogden
Say what you want, but the guy certainly has his own vision.

That's the problem. It's his "vision," as in singular. He only knows how to make one type of movie, and it's a hard type of movie to make well. I like the idea of bending other genres to fit his vision, which is why UNBREAKABLE is so good.

Some of his other movies have interesting concepts as well, but the execution is unbelievably bad. He uses Hitchcock-like techniques without comprehension of how or why those techniques work. His actors are given such terrible dialogue, and required to hit marks with such acrobatic precision that their performances are lifeless.

I will continue to give this guy the benefit of the doubt in the hopes that one day, he makes another great movie like THE SIXTH SENSE or UNBREAKABLE, but I'm not holding my breath.

However, I do agree that you should ignore what others say, and decide for yourself whether or not it's good.

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Tom Mundell
Expert Film Handler

Posts: 120
From: Silver Spring, MD, USA
Registered: Nov 2007

posted 06-15-2008 04:57 PM

I typically do go to movies regardless of the reviews, and probably will still make it to see this in the next week or so, but when there's this many bad reviews I have a tendency to end up going to other movies I'm interested in first...

I really enjoyed Lady in the Water, and Unbreakable is my favorite of his. I've been meaning to rent The Village for a while now, missed it in theaters.

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Mark J. Marshall
Film God

Posts: 3188
From: New Castle, DE, USA
Registered: Aug 2002

posted 06-16-2008 01:22 PM

M. Night should really just make trailers for other people's movies. In addition to the film's subtle left wing propaganda being annoying, and the acting being forced, and the dialog being bad, and the plot being unbelievable, the Kaahumanu 6 in Maui not only presented the movie out of frame for us, but managed to scratch their print after having it for only one day. Nice job, morons.

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