One of the best things about having a baby is being able to attend Mommy Matinees at a local theatre. What is that, you say? Mommy Matinees are movies shown for mothers AND their babies in the middle of the day and conveniently timed around naptime. Oh, and the theatre also serves pizza (ahem and alcohol) that you can eat WHILE WATCHING THE MOVIE.

Now anyone can attend these movie sessions but you need to be prepared to listen to babies crying. This is a full tolerance movie experience. And believe me when I say that it’s surprisingly easy to block out the sound of other kids crying when seeing a movie in an actual movie theatre is a rare event.

The only downside to the Mommy Matinee is that there is only one theatre which means only one choice of movie each week. The upside to this is that I get to see some good movies that I probably would have never chosen to see on my own. This movie for example, was a pleasant surprise and I highly recommend it.

The downside is that sometimes the movie is HORRIBLE but you watch it anyway, just for that two hours of escape. This week I escaped to a VERY BAD place. It certainly doesn’t bode well when the guy selling you the ticket warns you that it is a terrible movie before you even walk through the door. I think my response was “oh well, at least I’m out of the house”.

The movie this week was THE HAPPENING by M Knight Shyamalan. This is the same guy who wrote and directed The Sixth Sense, one of my all time favourite movies, which makes this one sting just a little bit more.

The Happening was awful! From the very first scene I remember thinking to myself about how awful the acting was (sorry Mark Wahlberg, but I guess you didn’t have much to work with). The writing was also terrible and don’t even get me started on the storyline. Basically it was an excuse for the writer/director to creatively think of a hundred different ways that a person can kill themselves. It’s a little gory in parts and definitely disturbing but not enough to carry a movie. The message (how urban sprawl is killing the environment) is not subtly shared – in fact it’s as subtle as someone beating you over the head with a mallet. And just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, the sound boom peeked down from the top of the screen. More than once!

OK, rant over. Consider this your community service announcement for the day.