Hey, I liked the diary thing, but I missed the "3 Good, 3 Bad" entries. Maybe Pierre could have written those? "Found next to last entry, written on cocktail napkin."
Alrighty, having read story, I am convinced (without watching) that Hollywood is not going to give us the story, as written.
We are not going to see a story that proclaims humanity to be less than the zenith of evolution. Vampires will always be the villains (or, at least the anti-heroes) of Hollywood--especially if they are pitted against a star like Wil Smith.
The U.S. audience is not ready to consider that our society is sick and there is a better society out there that some other species owns. Oh, we can watch a dystopia story (like Logan's Run) and be satisfied that their society is not OUR society, even when the original intent is to suggest that it IS our society with just a tweak. But Hollywood is not going to say, "We suck and there is something better out there." Moreover, Wil Smith will not say that.
Lastly, Wil Smith is not going to succumb to depression and accept death in favor of a new and better society. he is not going to identify and sympathise with the vampires. He will never decide that his culture is inferior, passé, and ready for abolition..
Let me tell you my prediction for the movie and explain why I will not watch it. Wil Smith will be the "last" man on earth who has to fight vampires. Wil will meet a girl, who, is almost a vampire but just human enough for him to love. Wil will convince her to betray her people and the two of them will defeat all the vampires. Together, they will leave the viewer with the suggestion that they will repopulate the earth with humans again, suggesting that "truth, justice and the American way" will always prevail against opposing forces. Such is the typical, post 9-11, movie plot.
Gods ... the book was great. It was thoroughly depressing and a great examination of our culture. The vampires were merely a catalyst for cultural anthropology and not an element for action/adventure. In the end, the reader/listener is left with questions regarding his way of life. Brilliant!
I can not trust Hollywood to recreate this story. I don't have to read another review of the movie. They are going to botch it in the way that only Hollywood can.
- I did dug how it all looked.
- The first scene where he discovers the vampires nest building is pretty intense.
- I wasn't ever bored.
Three Bad Things About this Movie
- The 'trap' was a huge stretch of intelligence.
- The fact that he ditched his wife and family to do research by himself was way selfish.
- It 'went there'.
What would be selfish would be going with your wife and kid because you're in a position of power who had a guaranteed flight out, instead of knowing you're the one who may be able to come up with a cure, and staying behind to help strangers who you've never met.
Yeah but maybe he should have thought of that when he knew how threatening this virus was and set up some kind of underground military lab bunker holed up with top scientists and sealed off to prevent infection.
Why was he all on his own in his basement when he was obviously just doing hit or miss type experimenting...? Glory monger I call him! With Time mag cover on the fridge to prove it!
Kind of ***Spoiler Alert***, so don't read this comment if you haven't already seen the movie....
I saw I am Legend on Friday and found it alright, more good than it was bad.
I'm going to steal a little Oddtodd strategy here...
Bad things: As todd said, some scenes were quite a stretch. I'm not sure how the zombiepeople can't break through a glass wall. The only intensity involved surprise screamings from the zomb-ays. I found the Shrek thing weird/out of place. They definitely could have trimmed certain parts of the movie down. Some of the scenes felt like nothing was happening whatsoever, and Will Smith was just sorta talking to his dog, then having flashbacks.
Good things: The scenery was amazing! This really saved the movie for me. This may sound evil, but I'm glad the dog died. I'm kind of sadistic like that. And I liked the ending, as, again, I love when characters die. Oh yeah, and I love Bob Marley so they kind of got some cheatery points there. Redeeeemption song. Ahem. Sorry.
All in all, I agree with todd's assessment of 3 cookies. His review was very funny!
Just watched it. Once the chick entered the movie, it just went down hill. The action, story, plot. You name it, it just sucked after halfway. And the ending, not that great. Boo on this one.
My son and I read the graphic novle taken from the short story. We went to see the movie last night. They totally missed the boat on the film.
The vampires were sentient beings in the books. They evolved into another species of human/vampires, more elvolved and humanlike than the first vampires. The whole point to the book was that the Will Smith character was Lengend because he was the last of his kind- thus frightening to the new species and their new society.
They started to touch on it in the movie when the vampire/zombies set up a trap for Smith. They should have gone with that plot line- instead they stuck to the howling mindless hordes. This could have been almost like the first Alien, but instead it was just another fast moving mindless zombie flick. What a disappointment....
I see very little similarity to 28 days later. Sure the situation (guy is alone with bitey baddies) is similar, but the plots were completely different. In 28 days he knows within a day that there are other survivors, he doesn't spend 3 years working on a cure thinking he is the last human, Legend had no sub-plot with the crazy army guys etc,etc.
Mind you, 28 Days Later was a complete scene-by scene rip-off of Day of the Triffids. (The book and BBC TV version, not the American movie version, which had little to do with the book at all).
I liked the movie. It was definitely better than Omega Man.
In all, I thought there were a couple of flaws that were hard to overlook.
First, he's this brilliant guy who made his house up into a minifortress. With all the cool metal doors and window shades, it would seem that in three years he could have really put together some nice electrocution system that would have made the place impenetrable.
Second, a smart guy who is a planner would have had some really nice escape route for when the nasties eventually did penetrate his fortress.
Third, if the nasties could literally smell where he had been and so on, every day that he ran a generator would probably have been like a beacon for the bad guys.
I liked that the bad guys were capable of setting traps and so on, and they obviously weren't looking for his help which was cool.
In the end, I think he had only one reason to live and that was to find the cure. Since he accomplished that, he only had to protect it long enough to get it out of the city.
I liked Smith's performance. He's really grown as an actor.
Grown beyond "Six Degrees Of Separation?" I said Smith was a good actor way back then, with that movie. He's only gotten worse in the last 15 years.
Maybe he took some acting classes in the interim between "Independence Day" and now.
Anyway, I read the story (that's Richard Matheson you philistines) and I can't see how a movie can be gleaned from it without adding a lot of "Hollywood Magic." The book is a brilliant examination of instinct vs. technology as we watch a man decscend into madness as a last resort. I doubt the movie can top it.
