The Happening + The Blob

• Tuesday, August 26 at 6:30pm (The Happening) + 8:30pm (The Blob)
• Saturday, August 30 at 2:30pm (The Happening) + 4:30pm (The Blob)

The Happening
M. Night Shyamalan, 2008, U.S., 35mm, 91m
Night Shyamalan’s singular eco-thriller is a deliberate throwback to midcentury B-movie horror that blends a cautionary tale of nature’s wrath with the campy genre thrills of the early atomic age. The story follows a married couple—an anxious high school science teacher (Mark Wahlberg) and his wide-eyed, soft-spoken wife (Zooey Deschanel)—as they flee a mysterious environmental event that triggers mass suicides across the Northeast. Casting stars against type and calibrating their performances to the stiff, sincere rhythms of vintage sci-fi, Shyamalan channeled panic through everything we associate with innocence and serenity: sunlit stillness, rustling trees, and the air itself. At once absurd and unsettling, The Happening is a daring tonal experiment about humanity’s gentle extinction.

Followed by:

The Blob
Irvin S. Yeaworth Jr., 1958, U.S., 35mm, 82m
Shot in Deluxe color 35mm on location in small-town Pennsylvania, this late-’50s sci-fi oddity turned a scoop of silicone gel into one of cinema’s most memorable monsters. A gelatinous, flesh-consuming alien crashes to Earth, and two teenagers—Steve McQueen (in his first starring role) and Aneta Corsaut—must convince their disbelieving elders that something terrible is spreading through town. With its eerily formless threat, catchy theme song, wholesome teen heroes, and ingeniously practical ooze effects (a dazzling mix of in-camera and optical printing), The Blob straddles atomic-era paranoia and gooey creature-feature fun. Clearly a sly tonal predecessor to the airborne, amorphous terror at the heart of The Happening. Rights courtesy of Worldwide Entertainment Corporation.