ipl-logo

The Happening Dystopian Theory

991 Words4 Pages

In the movie, The Happening, director M. Night Shyamalan depicts a dystopian present world in which the plants are killing off large populations of people from New York City to the fields of Philadelphia. The plants are releasing an unknown toxin that causes the people who become infected by it to kill themselves in immediate and gruesome ways. The main characters struggle to make sense of what’s happening and work to survive this catastrophic event caused by the killer plants. The film references many scientific theories, but fails to realistically explain the cause of this event and what made the plants react this way. The film misuses plants and gives them scientifically unproven abilities, which creates an absurd fantasy rather than a …show more content…

In one scene, we witness Mrs. Jones become infected by the plants suicidal toxin, but instead of immediately killing herself, she proceeds to smash her head through the windows to let the toxin in to infect Elliot (1:11:30). This scene causes the average viewer to believe that the plants made Mrs. Jones target Elliot instead of killing herself right away. Scientifically plants do not have the ability to take control of a human mind contrary to what the film showed. McCarthy quotes, “[Some] plants send out volatile hormones when they are attacked, the signals are evoked by a combination of damage and insect saliva. Predators such as wasps use this cue to find their prey” (McCarthy). In other words, plants simply release a special hormone when damaged to call upon wasps to fend off their attacker. This special ability can only specifically trigger the wasp’s attentions as stated here, “wasps have developed sensory apparatus to detect injured plant hormones” (McCarthy). This is the closest scientifically proven fact of plants having the ability to contact a different species. They do not come close to possessing a strong enough hormone to take over the human brain or even that of an insect. Furthermore, the improper use of plants causes the viewer to become misguided and causes the film to be looked down upon as just another horror fantasy film in the cli-fi

Open Document