*******SPOILER ALERT*******
Move on to my review if you want to see this movie. Don't read my spoiler if you want to see it.
I saw this movie last night and it was good, just another M Nyght Shyamalan movie.
Basically, Plants and humans communicate when humans give off a stimulus and plants react to the stimulus. Humans have a neuro toxin that prevents us from causing self-harm. What the plants have to do with this is that a theory given in the film is that the plants attack people as a defense mechanism. Elliot(Whalburg) deduces that plants and trees produce an airborne neurotoxin when the number of people that are present is larger than a threshold, and also that this threshold is decreasing with time. Victims experience loss of speech and physical disorientation; they freeze, and then unfreeze to commit suicide: people jump from buildings, shoot or hang themselves, one feeds himself to lions in the zoo, some cut themselves with a hairpin, barbed wire, glass, or a grass mower, drive into a tree, etc. Here's the plot.
Elliot and Julian(Leguizamo) are both High School teachers, Elliot a science teacher and Julian a math teacher. They are both in class when epidemic starts happening in Central Park in New York. The news spreads all over and students are dismissed until the epidemic is over.
Elliot, Alma (Deschanel) are a married couple and Elliot is suspicious of Alma being distant, To which Alma has a guilty conscious of going to a restaurant with another male companion. Elliot, Alma, Julian, and Jess(Julians 8 year old daughter) hop a train and the train stops in a small town in Western Pennsylvania, abandoning all passengers. The entire town decides to leave and escape the epidemic. Julian decides to go to Princeton to get his wife and rides with a family leaving Jess with Elliot and Alma. When Julian gets to Princeton, it's revealed that the city has been hit when they see bodies hanging from trees over a street. The driver drives into a tree when he becomes affected by the toxin with a tear in the roof of his jeep. Julian survives but also becomes affected and slashes his wrists with pieces of glass from the windshield.
Elliot and Alma hitch a ride with a man who brought of the theory of plants using toxins as a defense mechanism and they start drving toward the more western states when they come to a five way intersection. An MP drives up from one of the other roads toward the car Elliot is in, warning them not to go the way they're going stating that people at a camp have jumped in Barb wire. More cars come from the other roads to the intersection explaining the things they've seen. Soon, the intersection is filled with families and Elliot and the MP start making a plan to avoid all roads and to walk to a near by county that has a small population. They start walking in two groups. Soon, the toxin catches up with the group the MP is in. Everyone becomes affected and the MP pulls out his pistol and shoots himself in the head, followed by everyone else. The group Elliot, Alma, and jess are in is slightly smaller and are up ahead and hear the shots but cannot see what is happening as their is a hill between the two groups.
Elliot starts theorizing the theory above "that plants and trees produce an airborne neurotoxin when the number of people that are present is larger than a threshold, and also that this threshold is decreasing with time." The group splits up into three smaller groups. One group which has Elliot, Alma, Jess and two teenage boys. The toxins, which spread by wind, start chasing after Elliot and the group, but because of the size of the group, it doesn't affect them. They turn to see a large group walking through a model home project and the large group is affected. They see a man start a lawn mower and lay down in front of it. The run to a house in a field, which they assume is abandoned. A man occupying the home refuses to let them in and orders them to leave. The man pulls a shotgun and shoots the two teenage boys. Now just Elliot, Alma, and Jess being left, they leave the home and walk to another isolated home which is owned by an old lady isolated from the world who's oblivious to whats happening and refuses to hear what is happening. She gives them food and a place to stay.
The next morning, Elliot wakes up and Alma and Jess no where to be found. Elliot walks through the house looking for them. He enters a room and see's a doll on a bed. The old lady, who was suspicious of him being a thief, tells him to leave. She walks outside and becomes affected. Elliot locks himself in the room and hears Alma and Jess who are in a spring house in the back and can be heard through a speaking tube. He tells them to lock the windows. The presume that they are going to die but want to die together. They meet up outside but the epidemic has abruptly ended 25 hours after it started.
Fast foward three months later. They adopt Jess and Alma becomes pregnant, she watches the news, and the news says this whole thing will become worldwide one day. The movie shows two guys walking in Paris France and talking. One of the men becomes affected and the whole thing begins happening worldwide like the news had stated.
[/end spoiler]
I thought it was a good movie. A little slow at times but keeps you guessing the whole time. I would suggest seeing this.
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