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ria_oaksHuh. It's depressing to come home from seeing what I thought was a brilliant movie to go onto IMDB (granted, what can I expect from that site?) and see a bunch of people whining about how bad it was and how it wasn't as good as the original movies/the book/etc etc. Yeah, I'm sure that book's great and probably better, they always are, but after reading those reviews I'm actually less inclined to read it. I thought it was a great movie on it's own, even if it evidently wasn't a very good adaptation. There are a lot of good adaptations that are shitty movies (first Harry Potter, anyone? Not a shitty movie at all, but not a particularly great one either, and it was very faithful).
Anyway, point was I thought I Am Legend was fantastic. I don't watch zombie movies, and I haven't read the book, but I thought it was excellent so fuck it. A lot of people were compaining that it was just a bunch of over-blown special effects and action scenes, with no depth, which is funny because I thought the exact opposite. Yes, there were a fair number of action scenes and special effects and things blowing up, but it didn't feel at all like some big bombastic summer movie. It was very much centered on Will Smith's character, and his struggle to survive and stay sane is what carried the entire movie. Hell, Will Smith carried the entire movie - that man is fucking amazing. How did I never realize how good of an actor he is? He brought an incredible amount of depth to Neville, and made the character seem very real and human. I was impressed by how much he could convey with so little - I thought it was a very subtle performance. His pain when he had to kill Sam was heartbreaking, and I loved how close he was to the edge of insanity during the entire movie. He was so desperately lonely, and tried so hard to connect with anything (ie the mannequins), but when confronted with real humans again he no longer knew how to act.
And on that note, a lot of people think that the movie went downhill in the second half, but ultimately I really enjoyed the entire thing. Maybe it's because I haven't seen any zombie movies and therefore don't know the cliches, but I thought it was all pretty good. The final scenes of them in the house with the hoards of 'dark seekers' outside were pretty intense, and his sacrifice at the end was powerful. I thought so, anyway, even if a lot of people evidently thought it was a let down and was cheesy. But I liked how he stepped up and sacrified himself for the good of humanity, to try to fix what humanity had created. He had lost his faith since the virus spread, but he finally regained some of it at the end.
Another thing I liked was how it blended the humourous and the tragic - a lot of scenes were funny on some level, but ultimately were more tragic than anything. Dark humour, it a way, but more sad than funny. I thought they juxtaposed the dark humour with the tragedy very effectively, often to bring more depth to Neville's character by suggesting his state of mind throughout the movie.
Anyway... overall, good movie. Beautifully shot (I read on IMDB that it was actually shot in NYC - they completely blocked off parts of the city and imported plants to make it look grown over. I thought it looked too real to be CGI, and that definitely added to the realism of the movie and made it hit home harder - like this could really happen, and hell, maybe it could.), and perfectly acted by Will Smith. It was amazing how he carried the entire movie, with so much of it just being scenes of him alone or with the dog. I really did think it was more than just some special effects/action/zombie movie - it was a story of humanity and one man's struggle to survive. Could have been a lot worse, anyway, especially with a lesser actor. :)
(and Bob Marley's "Redemption Song" is stuck in my head now... and it's funny, because prior to hearing it in the ending credits I don't think I'd ever heard the original. I have a version which I believe is a Johnny Cash cover of it, at least according to whatever file sharing program I got it from, but not the original. Huh. ^^;)
Anyway, point was I thought I Am Legend was fantastic. I don't watch zombie movies, and I haven't read the book, but I thought it was excellent so fuck it. A lot of people were compaining that it was just a bunch of over-blown special effects and action scenes, with no depth, which is funny because I thought the exact opposite. Yes, there were a fair number of action scenes and special effects and things blowing up, but it didn't feel at all like some big bombastic summer movie. It was very much centered on Will Smith's character, and his struggle to survive and stay sane is what carried the entire movie. Hell, Will Smith carried the entire movie - that man is fucking amazing. How did I never realize how good of an actor he is? He brought an incredible amount of depth to Neville, and made the character seem very real and human. I was impressed by how much he could convey with so little - I thought it was a very subtle performance. His pain when he had to kill Sam was heartbreaking, and I loved how close he was to the edge of insanity during the entire movie. He was so desperately lonely, and tried so hard to connect with anything (ie the mannequins), but when confronted with real humans again he no longer knew how to act.
And on that note, a lot of people think that the movie went downhill in the second half, but ultimately I really enjoyed the entire thing. Maybe it's because I haven't seen any zombie movies and therefore don't know the cliches, but I thought it was all pretty good. The final scenes of them in the house with the hoards of 'dark seekers' outside were pretty intense, and his sacrifice at the end was powerful. I thought so, anyway, even if a lot of people evidently thought it was a let down and was cheesy. But I liked how he stepped up and sacrified himself for the good of humanity, to try to fix what humanity had created. He had lost his faith since the virus spread, but he finally regained some of it at the end.
Another thing I liked was how it blended the humourous and the tragic - a lot of scenes were funny on some level, but ultimately were more tragic than anything. Dark humour, it a way, but more sad than funny. I thought they juxtaposed the dark humour with the tragedy very effectively, often to bring more depth to Neville's character by suggesting his state of mind throughout the movie.
Anyway... overall, good movie. Beautifully shot (I read on IMDB that it was actually shot in NYC - they completely blocked off parts of the city and imported plants to make it look grown over. I thought it looked too real to be CGI, and that definitely added to the realism of the movie and made it hit home harder - like this could really happen, and hell, maybe it could.), and perfectly acted by Will Smith. It was amazing how he carried the entire movie, with so much of it just being scenes of him alone or with the dog. I really did think it was more than just some special effects/action/zombie movie - it was a story of humanity and one man's struggle to survive. Could have been a lot worse, anyway, especially with a lesser actor. :)
(and Bob Marley's "Redemption Song" is stuck in my head now... and it's funny, because prior to hearing it in the ending credits I don't think I'd ever heard the original. I have a version which I believe is a Johnny Cash cover of it, at least according to whatever file sharing program I got it from, but not the original. Huh. ^^;)
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Date: 2007-12-30 07:28 am (UTC)The worst part about the movie, however, was the CG. It really broke the realism for me. In this day and age when you have things like Golum/LotR, Golden Compass, and King Kong, there's no excuse to have shitty CG that looks like something the PS2 spat out in 2003. The lions at the beginning looked flat and plastic, and the Dark Seekers felt very weightless and superhuman.
Besides that, I liked it; really. Though I was kind of perturbed over how similar it is to 28 Days Later (I wonder if they used the same source material). That movie used real actors for the Infected instead of CG, and it felt more raw, tangible, and real. In fact, I highly recommend that movie - it's not any more of a zombie-movie than I Am Legend, if that's a factor.
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Date: 2007-12-30 07:33 am (UTC)And no, different source material. This movie's the third movie based on the novel "I Am Legend" - the first was "The Last Man on Earth" in the 60s, and the second was "The Omega Man" in the 70s.
Anyway, I'll keep that in mind. Is it overly scary or gorey? *coughisawimpcough* I was pretty nerve-wracked through a lot of this, but enjoyed it anyway... though I think I needed a sense of hope that it would at least kinda work out - total nihilsm and tragedy would have just depressed me and it was a pretty depressing (albeit fascinating) premise to begin with. Which I liked about it, of course, but I also liked thinking/hoping that it would end kinda happily. Kept me from getting too freaked out. ^^ Yeah, I'm a wimp.
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Date: 2007-12-30 08:00 am (UTC)As far as gore goes, it's there and more raw, but it's there for a reason; it's not like "BLOOD LOL." It's probably on the level of Supernatural, but really only near the end. Hot Fuzz would be another example.
It has that nice blend of tragedy and humor.
The main point of difference is that I Am Legend focuses on one character, while 28 Days Later focuses on a small group of people. So both movies examine different facets of survival brought to light by the situation. 28 Days Later deals heavily with maintaining trust and humanity, and brings up other questions that I Am Legend wasn't able to touch because it was so centered on one character.
It has a strong black female character, as well.
Plus, it's set in the UK and the characters have accents. That's awesome.
It also got an 89% on Rotten Tomatoes. Yeah, it's worth checking out.