Editorials > New Red-Band "Happening" Trailer

M. Night Shyamalan must be one of the most frequently derided "legitimate" filmmakers working today (taking into account that Uwe Boll and his ilk don't attract big names like Bruce Willis, Mel Gibson, or Paul Giamatti). Every film he's made since "The Sixth Sense" has gotten more than its fair share of trouble from critics big and small. But his next film, "The Happening," is a bit of a departure in a way. It's his first R-rated film, the new red-band trailer alone contains more violence than all of his films combined, and the scale of the project is exponentially larger than anything he's ever done. Take a look:

The premise, as you can see, is that some unknown event triggers unexpected mass suicides across the country. Mark Wahlberg and a group of survivors (a funky bunch, if you will) try to protect themselves from… suicide? I'm not exactly sure. But it's also got Zooey Deschanel as Wahlberg's wife, and John Leguizamo and Alan Ruck (Cameron Fry from "Ferris Bueller's Day Off") as fellow survivors. I personally sort of like the trailer. It's got a great creepy feel that's reminiscent of Romero's zombie films as well as Don Siegel's "Invasion of the Body Snatchers."

Here's an additional video you can watch to get a better idea of what Shyamalan is going for, and it also features a brief scene from the movie. I'm not sure I see the connection to "The Godfather" and I wish he wouldn't drool so much over his own work, but you've got to admire the man's enthusiasm for his film, his chosen genre, and for cinema in general. As for the clip, well, judge for yourselves. The performances seem a bit stilted, but then again, could that be itself an homage to the sci-fi Cold War paranoia classics of the 1950s? Yeah, probably not.

"The Happening" hits theaters on Friday June 13th. 

-David Morgan