“I’d just as soon kiss a Wookiee.” - Princess Leia

by Teresa Jusino

Don Castro, the highlight of “The Happening”

I really, really wish I’d seen The Incredible Hulk this weekend. However, I opted to go see M. Night Shyamalan’s latest movie, The Happening. The premise sounded interesting to me, but my reasons for seeing the film on opening night were much more personal. Don Castro, a friend of mine as well as a talented actor with whom I’ve worked, had a small role in it. So, I went with a large group of friends to cheer him on! His performance ended up being the best part of the whole movie.

M. Night Shamma-lamma-ding-dong is at it again, except this time, he’s got us right where he wants us! We’re used to his “twist endings”, huh? Well, not THIS time! This time, he’s outsmarted us! THIS time, he’s made a movie where NOTHING HAPPENS! You don’t like being able to predict a twist ending? FINE! Try predicting NOTHING! HA! Take THAT, critics! And on top of THAT, I’m going to make you afraid of TREES! And WIND! Didn’t see THAT coming, did you?!

The concept of the film is actually really interesting. People in the northeast of the country fall victim to a mysterious, airborne chemical, which blocks the self-protecting part of the brain, causing people to kill themselves. There’s a frightening parade of people stabbing themselves, shooting themselves, crashing their own cars, and throwing themselves off buildings. We learn that the chemical is coming from plants, that plants have the natural ability to evolve toxins that will protect them from an encroaching threat, since they can’t exactly get up and run from danger. In this case, the “threat” is us - humanity. And so, the plants began releasing the chemical in highly-populated areas first, in city parks, driving the masses further and further into the wilderness, thinning their numbers.

There was potential here. Man vs. Nature is a timeless story, and here it was at its most literal. Nature was fighting back, and suddenly there was nothing scarier than a gust of wind. It could have been a frightening cautionary tale warning us to take better care of the environment.

However, The Happening was a good-concept filling wrapped in a craptastic- movie crust. Shyamalan really needs to stop writing things. He’s a fine director and does suspense like nobody else, but Lord Above, does he write horrible dialogue. The kind of dialogue that made me cringe every other line. The kind of dialogue that made me envy those friends of mine who snuck beer into the movie theater and were tipsy for most of the film

Mark Wahlberg, Ashlyn Sanchez, and Zooey Deschanel looking pained. They wore these expressions for most of the movie.

The dialogue wouldn’t have been so bad had the lead actors risen to the occasion, but it was as though Mark Wahlberg and Zooey Deschanel had forgotten how to act. Now, I know Mark Wahlberg can act. His performances in films like Boogie Nights and The Departed prove he’s a good actor. Ms. Deschanel is something else. I’ve never understood how she keeps getting employed. She was great in Almost Famous, and I thought that would be her springboard to greatness. Instead, in everything I’ve seen her in since (Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Tin Man, etc), both the material and her performances have been mediocre at best, and I really don’t understand what the big deal is about her. In The Happening, both Wahlberg and Deschanel wander around looking perpetually like deer in headlights, not doing anything particularly constructive, and having really asinine conversations about their relationship in the midst of a major crisis. This could be attributed to the horrible writing or to direction that’s more interested in the spectacle of people killing themselves than in crafting quality character moments. However, John Leguizamo fared pretty well as a schoolteacher friend of Wahlberg’s character. Despite the horrific dialogue, he managed to convey some deep feeling. Sadly, he’s only in about half the movie. There’s also a great turn by Betty Buckley as a creepy-beyond-words old lady the leads come upon in their exodus from the big city. So, I’m tempted to say that Wahlberg and Deschanel have no excuse for their phoned-in performances, and the most frightening thing about the film is that Zooey Deschanel’s character discovers she’s pregnant, and these two are allowed to reproduce!

If you saw The Incredible Hulk this weekend instead, I envy you. I’ll probably be doing so next weekend. For those of you who were thinking about The Happening, save it for your Netflix queue if you must. But while you’re at it, keep your eye on the career of one Don Castro. That guy’s going places.

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TERESA JUSINO was born on the same day that Skylab fell. Coincidence? She doesn’t think so. As a writer, her work has appeared in Elmont Life newspaper, and on the sadly defunct website, CentralBooking.com. She is currently at work on a collection of short stories. As a geek, Teresa loves Star Trek, Lost, comics, and anything Joss Whedon ever touched. Also, she has a fangirl *squee-ing* crush on Brian K. Vaughan, which is now being rivaled by her burgeoning crush on Robert Downey Jr. in his Iron Man suit.