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Posted By: thedescent08 at 3:14pm, September 3, 2008
"I hope this is the last incarnation of Richard Mathesons's brilliant classic. Why does Hollywood have to mess with perfection? I was anxious to see it, having read the book several times, and I'm a fan of Hollywood's first impression of the original tale, The Omega Man (1971). I've also seen 28 Days Later; On The Beach; The Stand; Fail Safe; Threads; and The Day After several times each. I guess you could say I love the Apocalypse as a theme.
I've been a fan of Richard Matheson almost since I learned how to read. Besides Rod Serling, he is the man behind many of the classic Twilight Zone stories (second only to Serling himself), and has penned other novel-to-film classics like What Dreams May Come; A Stir of Echoes; The Legend of Hell House (paralleled, if not plagiarized, by Stephen King with his Rose Red); and countless screenplays. Where American Sci-Fi fiction is concerned, he is right up there with Isaac Asimov, Michael Crichton and Ray Bradbury. Stephen King and Dean Koontz are great too and I enjoy their work, but they write pulp. Unlike Matheson, Crichton, Bradbury and Asimov, there are no lessons or morals from King and Koontz. It's just entertainment.
This brings me around to my critique of the movie I am Legend. As entertainment, it works just fine. Will Smith is just okay, like the Chevrolet of Acting. He's predictable, and does what you want him to do. He brings no depth or personality to the protagonist at all. He's just a body. As for the other actors.......well, they are mostly CGI or creatures. Oh, yeah....there's a dog too.
For the second time in film (The Omega Man being the first), Robert Neville is portrayed as US Army medical officer who is intimately familiar with and is partially the cause of the virulent disease that has turned the world into bloodthirsty homicidal maniacs. In Matheson's book, as well as in The Omega Man, there is a biological warfare element. In the current film, the virus has more benign origins, but that's all I'll say. Matheson's literary Neville is just a blue-collar guy who is smart enough to try and find an answer to the catastrophe. That theme is what made the book so compelling. No state of the art laboratory, no heavy credentials. Neville was an ordinary guy who was caught up in extraordinary circumstances. By night, he holes up in his modest but heavily fortified LA home, blasting Beethoven and getting drunk to drown out the howling hordes of quasi intelligent vampires who want to kill him. By day, he hunts them down in their lairs and kills them in their sleep. He is actually the bogeyman....the terror by day, a daymare. "Brush your fangs, junior, or Neville will come and get you in your sleep!" Think about it. What does the title I am Legend really mean? Apparently, Akiva Goldsman has a very different opinion.
Obviously, Hollywood decided long ago that CGI and special effects will trump a good story every time. Like a child's video game, imagery has become the stimulus. It was briefly interesting to see Manhattan as deserted and overgrown, but the special effects seemed to be what the movie was relying on. Take them away, and there was nothing left. Was the movie bad? Not at at all, but it would have been more accurate to title it as Home Alone 4: WTF am I doing here?. Matheson's tale was botched again. So badly in fact, it bears no resemblance to the original book. That's ashame. Call me a purist, but why does Hollywood have to rework a classic, or inject so much "artistic license" into a plot that it becomes something utterly different than what was originally created? M. Night Shamalayan showed us what is still possible with superior writing, directing, and minimal special effects. Just watch The Sixth Sense. Here we have a film that had huge potential, given over to a mediocre screenwriter/producer and a relatively unknown director whose only experience was with music videos and the forgettable bomb, "Constantine." I think that the egos, greed, and arrogant laziness of the producers and screenwriters have a lot to do with the dumbing down of great original fiction...
Some ironies to consider: The book itself was only about one hundred and forty-odd pages long. Three movie attempts essentially blew it. The Omega Man wasn't close either, but was far more original in execution than the current version, in my opinion. The Spaghetti thriller, The Last Man on Earth(1964) with Vincent Price, was almost perfect where the story was concerned. Unfortunately, it was so low budget that the production quality made it almost unwatchable.
Matheson spun an enduring classic in less than two hundred pages. It was the quality of the material rather than "pictures;" or special effects, that made the story. What ashame that this movie couldn't have done the same. If you're into apocalyptic Sci-Fi, you'll probably enjoy this film. But don't expect too much." -- csullaf, imdb.com
The top ten reasons this is the most unoriginal movie ever made:
Cliché 1 – “And now we spread light into the darkness!” Tee-hee-hee! I think it was Jesus who said that before Hollywood decided to make it as common and meaningless as “Have a great day!”.
Cliché 2 – Monsters that try to look like zombies. And not cool zombies—try pathetic moaning retards that looked like they couldn’t poop and turned green or something. Scary? If I was Will Smith, I would have hit them with a rock and ended the terrible movie right there.
Cliché 3 – An all-consuming virus that turns people into zombies! The melodrama makes me cringe with excitement! Oh wait . . . that was the first time I heard that plotline with (far superior) video games like Resident Evil and (far, far superior) movies like The Hills Have Eyes. Give it a rest, please.
Cliché 4 – The post-apocalyptic plot that isn’t a plot at all. Or, most simply, the entire running time of the movie. My 2-year-old cousin has more imagination.
Cliché 5 – Not only are there zombies, but the zombies only come out in the dark! Wow! If I close my eyes and pretend that this hasn’t been done 1000 times, I might find that kinda cool!
Cliché 6 – The main character sacrifices himself for the good of a woman and humanity . . .
Cliché 7 – . . . but like every other Hollywood hit that the critics love, he’s too stupid for his own good. He had close to a minute (yes, I counted) to open up the shutter and escape the grenade, but he just stood there like a retarded teenager as it went off.
Cliché 8 – Boring opening, just like the cliché critics love. It took an hour and a half before anything action-like happened. Oh wait, there was no action. I’m thinking about myself peeing after it was over—that was more action-packed than the entire movie put together.
Cliché 9 – Flat characters who’s names I couldn’t even remember during the movie, much less after it was over.
Cliché 10 – This is my favorite. Can you guess it? EVERYTHING IN THE MOVIE HAS BEEN DONE IN AT LEAST 3 OTHER MOVIES I’VE SEEN.
People say Napoleon Dynamite didn’t have a plot? Honestly, folks, this was more pointless than Napoleon even could have been. And at least he wasn’t a sad cliché who was too stupid to open up a door and save his life.
No idea why so many people liked this movie. For one it was such an overrated hype that when I sat in the theater and watched it I was extemely disappointed! This movie was ok but honestly I would never watch it again. It was a little boring, and Will Smith didnt do that well of a job acting and in reality I and most likly anyone in that situation would probly kill themselves! Sorry just wasnt a good movie for me! Also the dead people looked retarded they were like pale and naked I much rather of seen Zombies or something!
very very very slow and boring. but it became good. then when ana cme in just went dull.
Posted By: kaufmanfan at 8:31pm, February 21, 2008
really good. everything was great about this. the atmosphere, the dog, and especially the acting. really good. i just wished they used the ending to the book instead.
This movie would have been much better if it came out without the title, I am Legend. The whole time I was comparing it to the original novel by Richard Matheson. The movie is about 12 percent accurate to the novel and is better compared to the 1971 movie, the Omega Man, with Charlton Heston.
For a movie about just one man throughout most of it, Will Smith is one of a short list of actors that can keep my attention throughout.
The visuals are very well done besides the use of the "zombies" that are computer generated. I have read they actually used real life actors in the movie, but they did not like the way they look and rotoscoped the cgi zombies into it. I hope their is a special feature on the dvd release to see how it might have looked.
I am Legend is a good popcorn movie for entertainment. A story with more chills and fear, please try reading the novel; You will not be disappointed.
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