The Happening

Here's one of my pet peeve issues: everyone complains when directors do what made them a cult if not household name. It happens all the time with recording artists. Directors as different as Wes Anderson, Francois Truffaut, Wong Kar Wai, and M. Night Shyamalan just like Alfred Hitchcok in another era, basically all make, or made, the same film time after time. Personally I see enough films that style over substance can be a call to sanity against typical weak Hollywood storylines. Shyamalan's a good enough director to make creepiness worth watching.
There's a lot of creep, and shudder, and 9/11 imagery that stirs the soul. And then Night lowers the boom. You're either on the guy's wavelength, or after this film and Unbreakable his train, or you're not. You the reader should continue to scan this review if you want to know what happens after the first reel. Your humble scribe is so plugged into the scene that, for instance, when I saw The Sixth Sense for the first time I already knew Bruce Willis is really dead through the entire film. In other words, spoilers aren't as big a deal to me as to the average filmgoer.
The Happening basically takes the plot of The Day of the Triffids, an early 50s British novel that was made into a cool film in the early 60s, and mixes that with the kind of end of the world scenario that worked for Night in Signs, and in other films like 28 Days Later. In Day of the Triffids a bizarre meteor shower blinds the majority of Earth's population and the titular plants move and devour people. In The Happening everyone has sight, yet cannot see the obvious, and the plants kill without moving.
Try to see past the ad hype that proclaims "his first R-rated film." Yes, there's some spurting blood from head wounds and the guy that lies down in front of an industrial strength lawn mower but it's really the amount of suicides that rapidly happen in a row that throws the alert switch. And after Zohan gets a PG-13 despite its looney sex innuendo it's hard to distinguish the thin line that makes one film adult and another kid friendly.
The Happening has a good explanation for the plant attack. At least the scientific mumble jumble about honey bees disappearing and plants releasing defensive odors or hormones sounds convincing. There's an ecological pessimism that permeates The Happening. You might find yourself talking to plants and trees after you see this movie.