I Am Legend Review
by Adam Frazier
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"There was no sound but
that of his shoes and the now senseless singing of birds. Once I
thought they sang because everything was right with the world, Robert
Neville thought. I know now I was wrong. They sing because they’re
feeble-minded.” – Richard Matheson
Director Francis Lawrence’s I Am Legend is the latest adaptation of Matheson’s 1954 sci-fi novel by the same name, which has been filmed twice before, as The Last Man on Earth (1964) starring Vincent Price, and The Omega Man (1971) starring Charlton Heston.
Adapted by writers Mark Protosevich (Poseidon) and Akiva Goldsman (A Beautiful Mind), I Am Legend
stars Will Smith stars Robert Neville, a military virologist in 2012
Manhattan – the only survivor of a man-made plague that has wiped out
humanity. By day he prowls the city for supplies with his faithful dog
Sam; by night he hides in his fortified Washington Square home from
nasty bands of light-sensitive, flesh-eating zombies.
In the
original novel (which Stephen King says influenced him more than any
other) the creatures that stalk Neville are quite different. Neville
strung up garlic and used mirrors, crosses and sharpened stakes against
his enemies, who were like traditional vampires, not the super-strong
zombies Will Smith battles.
By changing the nature of the
creatures, the book’s low-key realism and believability is lost to
Hollywood clichés and cop-outs. Neville’s sharpened stakes are replaced
with high-powered rifles and grenades. By making Neville a scientist
his nature is also changed. Instead of merely trying to survive, Will
Smith’s character combs the streets for lab subjects to test anti-virus
serums on in an attempt to end the plague.
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One has to wonder, with 99% of human life eradicated, what
good is an anti-virus anyway, when the sole survivor is already immune?
Will
Smith’s performance as Neville is memorable and in its own way, just as
haunting as Vincent Price’s so many years ago. Smith’s Neville is
disturbed by the intense psychological trauma of not only having
everyone he ever knew die, but also being completely isolated from all
human contact for three years; his only companion being his dog, Sam.
The
first half of the film is brilliant. We buy into Neville’s loneliness –
his daily routine of visiting the local video store and sparking
conversations with mannequins he’s set up along the way. Then there’s
the pier incident. You see, every day at Noon Robert Neville sends out
a radio broadcast, asking survivors to meet him at a pier in the city.
And
then it happens – Neville encounters two other survivors, a woman named
Anna and Ethan, a little boy. It’s from this point that the film breaks
down, losing all the despair and isolation it built up in the previous
act, and replacing it with the predictable.
In the end, I Am Legend
is a great popcorn flick but falls short of paying tribute to
Matheson’s amazingly dark and horrifying novel. Director Francis
Lawrence (Constantine) is too
dependent on computer-generated effects to tell his story. The zombies
are completely generic, far from legendary and rarely convincing.
I
suppose it is more cost effective to sacrifice story and believability
for the demands of today’s sales-driven film industry than it is to
hire a few extras to chase Will Smith around the city.
I Am Legend
is your stereotypical Will Smith sci-fi flick. It could have been so
much more, unfortunately it plays out as more of a missed opportunity. 3 out
of 5 I Am Legend
Australian release: 3rd January, 2008
Cast: Will Smith, Dash Mihok, Alice Braga
Director: Francis Lawrence
Website: Click
here.
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