THE HAPPENING

THE HAPPENING is the story of Elliott (played by Mark Wahlberg) and his wife Alma (played by Zooey Deschanel), who are caught up in a “happening” where groups of people suddenly and without reason kill themselves. This causes a national panic. Elliott and Alma along with a friend’s daughter flee to the countryside to escape whatever is causing this menace.

Starting out with a large group, all the others eventually commit suicide or are killed by panicking strangers. At first, the problem is suspected to be chemical warfare from terrorists, but as the story progresses, science teacher Elliott figures out that the threat is from nature itself. The movie presents a politically correct, radical environmentalist worldview that’s New Age.

This movie from director M. Night Shyamalan is well made and at times very suspenseful. However, the plot sometimes teeters on the absurd. Scenes of characters running away seem more silly than suspenseful. The characters flee from place to place, encountering different characters who are also fleeing.

Throughout the movie, multiple characters kill themselves in varying and highly graphic, disturbing ways. Elliott and Alma’s marriage is having trouble, but through this experience they realize and affirm their love for one another. Sensing that they are about to die, Elliott braves going outside in order to cross a field so that he and Alma can die together.

The movie is pagan throughout, purporting that nature is evolving and sentient. This ridiculous message is heavy handed. While there is minor foul language and limited negative elements, the movie’s extreme, gore-filled continual violence makes up for that. Each place the characters flee is another place where people become “infected” and kill themselves, but in a different manner each time. The violence is almost always on camera with much blood. Sometimes the manner of suicide is absurdly comical, as in the case of a man at a zoo attacking a lion.

In one sequence, the couple meets an elderly lady who refuses to leave her house and has had no contact with the outside world. She does have what appears to be a child corpse in a spare bedroom surrounded by icons and images of Jesus. When she is infected, she recites Psalm 23.

While THE HAPPENING is sometimes an effective suspenseful movie, it is disturbing and filled with pagan ideology. Media-wise viewers will need to exercise much discernment about this movie.

Of course, in reality, God is in control of nature, which He created ex nihilo, out of nothing. God has given mankind dominion over the earth, including its creatures, but we should exercise that dominion wisely. When natural disasters strike, people should turn to God through Jesus Christ, who commands us all to take care of one another, especially the members of our own family.