The premise is that people are mysteriously killing themselves, seemingly for no reason whatsoever. We see someone shove a hair needle into her jugular, a guy lies down in front of a moving lawnmower and others simply shoot themselves. At the center of this is high school science teacher Elliot Moore (Mark Wahlberg) and his wife Alma (Zooey Deschanel) and their friend Julian (John Leguizamo) and his young daughter. They flee in a train from Philadelphia but the train stops in a small town somewhere in Pennsylvania. But they're not safe, as whatever is causing people to kill themselves is in the air.
Julian decides to hitch a ride back to New Jersey, to try to find his wife, leaving his daughter with Elliot and Alma. They eventually stumble upon an abandoned looking house, without electricity, where a crazy old woman lives (Betty Buckley of EIGHT IS ENOUGH). She is nuts.
The reason why all this is happening is interesting and plausible, though for some reason I didn't find this quite as creepy as SIGNS or THE SIXTH SENSE. It also has more than a bit in common with DAY OF THE TRIFFIDS.
Also, even though this is an R-rated movie the main characters are these "Goody Two-shoes" types who are absurdly normal, which I guess is supposed to heighten the contrast between them and what's going on in the world. I
Of all the M. Night Shyamalan movies to date, this comes in last. It just wasn't happening for me.