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Hollywood Hues Manoj Night Shyamalan’s The Happening begins well but slides into horror for horror’s sake, writes Ervell E. Menezes
So Manoj Night Shyamalan is at it again with his eye on the celestial or occult`A0and which better place to begin than the New York or the Big Bad Apple? It’s early morning in Central Park and`A0the Americans never-ending fear of terrorists is instantly targeted. The victim starts with confused speech but later`A0gets suicidal. Guns are easily available and`A0bodies soon keep piling up.`A0Could it be some`A0toxin or gas warfare? These are the immediate possibilities in The Happening. The establishing shots are good because it cuts to Philadelphia where science lecturer Elliot Moore (Mark Wahlberg) is waxing eloquent on`A0the extinction of bees in certain areas`A0and he has a rapt audience, but class has to be interrupted because the New York happening has already`A0made news. From the Central Park cripple to the road to Pennsylvania, death is a familiar visitor and coming from all directions. The train in which Elliot, his precocious`A0wife Alma (Zooey Deschnel) and Jess (Ashlyn Sanchez) are travelling is stopped at Filbert town. That Elliot’s loquacious friend Julien (John Leguizamo), leaves his daughter Jess with the couple,`A0seems odd and Alma does not get along too well with Julien who conveniently makes his exit. From here on the three of them are on their own as they tread the Pennsylvanian outback. The leaves rustling in the wind hint at nature’s hand in the`A0phenomenon and for starters it lends itself to that eerie feeling but Shymalan repeats it too often only the dilute the effect and give it a shade of pretentiousness. The botanical mumbo-jumbo too does little to help. In this film Shyamalan has omitted his characteristic touches. There is no contorted horror or gotcha ending and after the initial bloom of expectation the "what’s next" element just peters away with the film deteriorating into a horror-for-horror’s sake entertainer. The Mrs Jones (Betty Buckly) character too is wafer thin and avoidable and is just padding up. A sub-plot would have helped. The fact that the affected persons kill only themselves further reduces the horror. Hence after the halfway mark it is downhill racer and though Mark Wahlberg does his best to get under the skin of the character but seems to be thoroughly wasted. Newcomer Zooey Deschnel is at best patchy and little Ashlyn Sanchez is neither here nor there. It is all very contrived and if one has to look for plus points James Newton Howard’s music provides some relief and Tak Fujimoto’s camerawork caresses the outdoors, remember the song "Pennsylvania and the far of mountain skies"? But as for Shyamalan, he is struggling all the time. It is a case of flattering only to deceive — actually a king-sized deception. Incidentally, in the
mid-1960s and in the early hippie days there was a thought-provoking
kidnap drama also called The Happening where Anthony Quinn was
given a peep into the hippie culture by four protagonists, one of whom
was the debut-making Faye Dunaway.
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