Don't be eyeing anyone's lemon drink, you hear!?! I thought this film may be good for reasons that are now forgotten by me. I mean, the director M. Night's previous movie I watched was not very good (The Village) and the one before this one was considered bad as well. Also, this film stars Mark Wahlberg who I have never seen a movie of his I enjoyed! Combine this with Zoey of the vacant stare and dead eyes and why did I think this thing would be anything but bad? Then the whole reason behind what is going on is absurd as are some of the deaths, stuff one tends to see in a funny Monty Python sketch! Seriously, not sure why it has a five here, unless the people who are enjoying it think of it as a black comedy, then it sort of works...
The story, well people start dropping off buildings and stabbing themselves. Must be a chemical attack! Because you know, there is some chemical that can make a person become confused, then walk backwards and then perform sometimes very elaborate suicides...NOT!!! I was thinking when watching the trailers something perhaps supernatural was going on, but yes, it all boils down to chemicals the vegetation is producing. Makes you all confused and unable to move properly, but have no trouble revving up a lawnmower and lying in front of it. Our 'hero' Marky Mark who wears the same expression the entire film. We get to watch him and his wife drag a girl around, get two young boys killed and get conseuling from John Leguizamo who had to be glad he was only in this thing for 20 minutes of screen time...Meanwhile, we get to see some deaths, but while watching dude explore house there were probably people driving cars into shark tanks and dying in all sorts of strange and entertaining ways!
As I said, Mark is pretty bland here, but I think that is his trademark. Same with Zooey, we get to watch two of the most unlikable people try to survive this thing, this happening! Meanwhile, both the main actors and the plot are at times overshadowed by randomly encountered people like really strange looking dude who really likes hotdogs and crazed, mean old lady who has her lemon drink! Seriously, there could have been a whole movie just about her!
The movie kind of reminds me of the War of the Worlds with Tom Cruise from 2005. Basically, you have a totally interesting event happening, but we are forced to watch the film from one very small perspective only in this one the characters are less likable and the event less plausible. M. Night would go on to have a bit of success after this with a couple of films and a couple of busts, not sure if this is the low point, or Lady in the Water or The Last Airbender, but heck who hasn't gotten some bumps in the road. In the end, it was bad, but honestly I should have known it was going to be bad when the main selling point of this film was that it was M's first rated R film...