After reading a slightly negative review of this film on the interweb I didn’t have very high expectations. Which is probably a good thing. I Am Legend is pretty much 28 Days Later meets The Omega Man. And don’t ya just love the way that zombies are always screaming and scary these days?
Will Smith stars as the sole New York survivor of a virus created by Dr Smarty-Pants, and he’s working hard to find the cure. Naturally this isn’t easy, especially when he pisses off some uber-monster.
I think my greatest concern is that Will Smith would ham it up in the classic Independence Day style. All ‘bad’ and no substance, but, I was pleasantly surprised. You can actually feel the guy’s isolation and there are some genuinely sad, and scary moments thrown in.
The story is predictable, but you get that in blockbusters based on previous films. Basically Legend is a strap-yourself-in and enjoy-the-ride horror with all the frights where you expect frights, all the schmaltz where you expect schmaltz, and… Bob Marley!
The upside is that it doesn’t cross that fine, fine line between schmaltz and terrible cheese. There were plenty of opportunities for over-acted angst, but they never quite take you there. So, I’d recommend you go enjoy it.
And, watch out for the CGI lions early in the piece. Bloody awful.
Hum… I don’t really give a crap about the CGI, but I was seriously underwhelmed by the much hyped “$5 million scene” shot at night at the Brooklyn Bridge/South Street Seaport when Neville is trying to get his family out of Manhattan before the bridges are destroyed.
Spielberg’s War of the Worlds was an outrageous sack of shit on every level, but the equivalent scene when Cruise and Co.reach a ferry just ahead of the tripods is masterful. The panic and chaos never lets up. For all his flaws, Spielberg sure knows how to make that kind of complex set piece work.
Franics Lawrence – not so much. Well, give him credit for the half of IAL that was very good indeed, and I’d give him the benefit of the doubt for the rest. The script gets seriously stupid when the dog dies and the irritating Madonna and Child show up, and I doubt anyone could have turned that particular sow’s ear into something that didn’t bring me out in hives. Remeber we’re talking about a script substantially doctored by Akiva Goldsman who crimes against literacy include ‘Batman and Robin’, ‘A Beautiful Mind’, ‘I, Robot’ and ‘The Da Vinci Code’.
i’m included to agree. everything from the pooch getting bit was rubbish…
in fact, the only really good stuff was smith acting out the loneliness and isolation of the character. i genuinely believed the scene in the video store where he finally says hello to the girl.
in fact, the only really good stuff was smith acting out the loneliness
Yup, Will Smith actually is a pretty decent actor when he has the material and firm direction that doesn’t let him fall into lazy reliance on his considerable charm. I think of the great films North by Northwest and Vertigo, where Hitchcock didn’t so much play Cary Grant and Jummy Stewart ‘against type’, so much as take their established personae into deeper – and much more interesting – depths.
And here’s something else that pissed me off: The presentation of the infected in the film. One minute, they’re mindless ravenous animals. Which works fine… until, they arbitrarily become intelligent enough to construct a trap identical to the one Neville used to capture his ‘lab rat’ earlier in the film. Would have been a lot more interesting – and more frightening – if they’d had the guts to drop the sentimental bullshit, and follow the novel where some of the infected are forming a society of their own. And they don’t consider themselves to be the monster – Neville is.
He is legend — like vampires are to us, he has become a mythical beast that kills innocents while they are sleeping without mercy or reason. The last paragraph of Richard Matheson’s novel still gets me like a kick in the guts, and if the film-makers had the nerve to go there we might have had a minor classic on our hands. But again Spielberg comes to mind — ‘AI’, ‘Minority Report’ and ‘War of the Worlds’ were all attempts to bring some darker, more adult colours into his palate. And there are parts of all three movies that are quite brilliant. but ultimately the one virus he can’t resist is sentimentality. That’s what ultimately FUBARs ‘I Am Legend’ for me — wimping out.
For perhaps the first time in my life I agree with you entirely. First half of the movie: fine. Second half: right when we should have been pondering just who might be the monster here, we end up with ‘god saves the day’ (oh, and God bless America). Which was a pity.*
_________________________________
*Not, mind you, that I’ve got anything in particular against God or America – just that that particular ending needn’t be compulsory in Hollywood nowadays.
@ craig. ah, but that’s the thing. they aren’t depicted as ravening animals. the bit where smith makes the annotation that “the darkseekers are degrading” because that one exposes himself to uv is a red herring. that’s actually indicating that smith doesn’t really know what he’s dealing with.
on a further note, i think the bad-guy-darkseeker wasn’t just trying to get smith, he was trying to recover the young female smith had captured. all the clues that they’re not just marauders is there, but as you say, it simply wasn’t developed in favour of some meaningless drivel about “god delivering [the real] humanity”.
Ah well, there’s ‘Cloverfield’ to look forward to tomorrow – and I’m mildly optimisitc its going to be a pleasantly brainless throwback to the 50’s creature feature rather than another ‘Snakes on a Plane’.
And a week later, ‘Sweeney Todd’ which looks like the one where Tim Burton finally gets his freak back. Seriously, how many blow jobs did he have to give before getting the greenlight for a $50 million dollar film version of Sondheim’s jolly little blood-splattered musical about musical about a serial killing barber obsessed with revenge, a woman who regards his victims as an innovative business opportunity and the sneaky idea that (literal) cannibalism is not such a stretch in the world the Industrial Revolution wrought.
Hi I liked the movie though would have really preferred the original ending where in like in the Richard Matheson book Neville never died making him the only human survivor and thus The Legend. If you want to see the original ending of the movie then you can visit my blog at htttp://likeiknowit.wordpress.com and check the review section.
Actually, according to the book he was the last man surviving who would capture the creatures to conduct the freaky injection tests in vain to cure them. Infact book also hints that all those vampires were scared of him. In the end he simply returns the captured Alice Braga and survives to be a true Legend.
4 January, 2008
Review – I Am Legend
Posted by Che Tibby under films, , scifi[11] Comments
After reading a slightly negative review of this film on the interweb I didn’t have very high expectations. Which is probably a good thing. I Am Legend is pretty much 28 Days Later meets The Omega Man. And don’t ya just love the way that zombies are always screaming and scary these days?
Will Smith stars as the sole New York survivor of a virus created by Dr Smarty-Pants, and he’s working hard to find the cure. Naturally this isn’t easy, especially when he pisses off some uber-monster.
I think my greatest concern is that Will Smith would ham it up in the classic Independence Day style. All ‘bad’ and no substance, but, I was pleasantly surprised. You can actually feel the guy’s isolation and there are some genuinely sad, and scary moments thrown in.
The story is predictable, but you get that in blockbusters based on previous films. Basically Legend is a strap-yourself-in and enjoy-the-ride horror with all the frights where you expect frights, all the schmaltz where you expect schmaltz, and… Bob Marley!
The upside is that it doesn’t cross that fine, fine line between schmaltz and terrible cheese. There were plenty of opportunities for over-acted angst, but they never quite take you there. So, I’d recommend you go enjoy it.
And, watch out for the CGI lions early in the piece. Bloody awful.
11 Responses to “Review – I Am Legend”
4 January, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Yeah it’s not a bad film, but as is so often the case a pale shadow of the book.
5 January, 2008 at 8:32 pm
I think I’ll wait for it to come out on DVD.
I saw the shorts and thought ‘h#, too much lick 28 Days Later’. Not enough grab factor for me to part with my hard-earned cash.
6 January, 2008 at 10:23 pm
I Am Legend is pretty much 28 Days Later meets The Omega Man.
That’s because it is The Omega Man.
(Grumble people who don’t know their SF grumble…)
7 January, 2008 at 5:49 am
Well… that was intentional (for those who actually don’t know their SciFi!)
It would have been better if the zombies had been actual vampires, imho.
11 January, 2008 at 1:02 am
Hum… I don’t really give a crap about the CGI, but I was seriously underwhelmed by the much hyped “$5 million scene” shot at night at the Brooklyn Bridge/South Street Seaport when Neville is trying to get his family out of Manhattan before the bridges are destroyed.
Spielberg’s War of the Worlds was an outrageous sack of shit on every level, but the equivalent scene when Cruise and Co.reach a ferry just ahead of the tripods is masterful. The panic and chaos never lets up. For all his flaws, Spielberg sure knows how to make that kind of complex set piece work.
Franics Lawrence – not so much. Well, give him credit for the half of IAL that was very good indeed, and I’d give him the benefit of the doubt for the rest. The script gets seriously stupid when the dog dies and the irritating Madonna and Child show up, and I doubt anyone could have turned that particular sow’s ear into something that didn’t bring me out in hives. Remeber we’re talking about a script substantially doctored by Akiva Goldsman who crimes against literacy include ‘Batman and Robin’, ‘A Beautiful Mind’, ‘I, Robot’ and ‘The Da Vinci Code’.
11 January, 2008 at 9:51 am
i’m included to agree. everything from the pooch getting bit was rubbish…
in fact, the only really good stuff was smith acting out the loneliness and isolation of the character. i genuinely believed the scene in the video store where he finally says hello to the girl.
as for the saving him from the pontoon? bullshit.
11 January, 2008 at 6:22 pm
in fact, the only really good stuff was smith acting out the loneliness
Yup, Will Smith actually is a pretty decent actor when he has the material and firm direction that doesn’t let him fall into lazy reliance on his considerable charm. I think of the great films North by Northwest and Vertigo, where Hitchcock didn’t so much play Cary Grant and Jummy Stewart ‘against type’, so much as take their established personae into deeper – and much more interesting – depths.
And here’s something else that pissed me off: The presentation of the infected in the film. One minute, they’re mindless ravenous animals. Which works fine… until, they arbitrarily become intelligent enough to construct a trap identical to the one Neville used to capture his ‘lab rat’ earlier in the film. Would have been a lot more interesting – and more frightening – if they’d had the guts to drop the sentimental bullshit, and follow the novel where some of the infected are forming a society of their own. And they don’t consider themselves to be the monster – Neville is.
He is legend — like vampires are to us, he has become a mythical beast that kills innocents while they are sleeping without mercy or reason. The last paragraph of Richard Matheson’s novel still gets me like a kick in the guts, and if the film-makers had the nerve to go there we might have had a minor classic on our hands. But again Spielberg comes to mind — ‘AI’, ‘Minority Report’ and ‘War of the Worlds’ were all attempts to bring some darker, more adult colours into his palate. And there are parts of all three movies that are quite brilliant. but ultimately the one virus he can’t resist is sentimentality. That’s what ultimately FUBARs ‘I Am Legend’ for me — wimping out.
14 January, 2008 at 11:58 am
Craig,
For perhaps the first time in my life I agree with you entirely. First half of the movie: fine. Second half: right when we should have been pondering just who might be the monster here, we end up with ‘god saves the day’ (oh, and God bless America). Which was a pity.*
_________________________________
*Not, mind you, that I’ve got anything in particular against God or America – just that that particular ending needn’t be compulsory in Hollywood nowadays.
14 January, 2008 at 3:47 pm
@ craig. ah, but that’s the thing. they aren’t depicted as ravening animals. the bit where smith makes the annotation that “the darkseekers are degrading” because that one exposes himself to uv is a red herring. that’s actually indicating that smith doesn’t really know what he’s dealing with.
on a further note, i think the bad-guy-darkseeker wasn’t just trying to get smith, he was trying to recover the young female smith had captured. all the clues that they’re not just marauders is there, but as you say, it simply wasn’t developed in favour of some meaningless drivel about “god delivering [the real] humanity”.
16 January, 2008 at 4:23 pm
Ah well, there’s ‘Cloverfield’ to look forward to tomorrow – and I’m mildly optimisitc its going to be a pleasantly brainless throwback to the 50’s creature feature rather than another ‘Snakes on a Plane’.
And a week later, ‘Sweeney Todd’ which looks like the one where Tim Burton finally gets his freak back. Seriously, how many blow jobs did he have to give before getting the greenlight for a $50 million dollar film version of Sondheim’s jolly little blood-splattered musical about musical about a serial killing barber obsessed with revenge, a woman who regards his victims as an innovative business opportunity and the sneaky idea that (literal) cannibalism is not such a stretch in the world the Industrial Revolution wrought.
19 April, 2008 at 6:08 pm
Hi I liked the movie though would have really preferred the original ending where in like in the Richard Matheson book Neville never died making him the only human survivor and thus The Legend. If you want to see the original ending of the movie then you can visit my blog at htttp://likeiknowit.wordpress.com and check the review section.
Actually, according to the book he was the last man surviving who would capture the creatures to conduct the freaky injection tests in vain to cure them. Infact book also hints that all those vampires were scared of him. In the end he simply returns the captured Alice Braga and survives to be a true Legend.
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