I Am Legend ~ Possible Spoilers
Saturday, December 15th, 2007 - 2:32am
I just got back from I Am Legend and I'm interested to hear peoples' reactions.
Personally, I really enjoyed the film. If nothing else, it succeeded in giving me an intense emotional connection to the characters. I was genuinely concerned for their wellbeing.
It definitely started out strong, but the last 20 minutes or so were a little weak. Basically from the incident at the end of the pier onward (Yes, I put a spoiler tag in the title, but I don't want to start throwing out huge spoilers in the first post if I can avoid it).
Anyway, I just wanted to get the Goodjer perspective on the movie. If another spoiler-safe zone exists to discuss this film, I apologize.
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I agree with everything you said kaostheory. I really enjoyed the movie and became very emotionally connecter to the characters. The last 30 minutes had several plot holes, but nothing you can't look past. All-in-all, I really enjoyed the movie.
Jadawin wrote:
I almost cried for Sam. They did an excellent job with the character development.
Yet even then we ran like the wind,
whilst our laughter echoed under cerulean skies...
Edit: NM. I didn't know the dog's name was Sam. Good to know I can skip this movie.
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A couple of extras.
Last night I dreamed I was living in that world. Quite. Disturbing.
The woman he meets mentions that there is a survivor colony in the mountains of Vermont because the virus couldn't survive in the cold. Fair Enough, but wasn't it Christmas in New York City with record snow falls when the outbreak happened? Hmmmm. Although I can look past it since the woman has no real, hard information about the how and why of the virus.
I don't know about the rest of you, but the Zombie movie with 1(One) superzombie in it that defies everything about zombidom is getting a little tierd. I don't watch all that many horror/zombie movies but in the last few years there have been 3 I can think of off the top of my head: 28 Weeks Later, Land of the Dead (which ever one came out a couple years ago and sucked balls) and now I Am Legend.
Fletcher wrote:
Can anyone comment on how closely it follows the original novel?
Last Man on Earth and Omega Man had elements (I suppose) but weren't the film I was looking for. Is this any better? With Will Smith in the lead role I really can't see it, but I'm hoping to be suprised
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If they really are zombies, then the team who made this has no right to call it I Am Legend. I'm okay with changing the location to NYC, but changing the very nature of the threat kind of undermines the whole story.
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I call them zombies mostly because they do not act as the traditional vampires are supposed to act. They're not "intelligent" killing machines. Basically, they seem to be Vampires with the Rage virus (from 28 Days/Weeks Later). They are zombies in that they are perceived to have no rationality to them. They Feed. That's all they ever really do. Except for the one uber-zompire who apparently has an engineering degree.
Fletcher wrote:
I really enjoyed the movie, I have a feeling there was a lot cut out of the movie because of time constraints. I really, really hate when they do that. I would rather spend an extra 20 - 30 minutes in theater if it means a cleaner story. Still though the flaws weren't all that bad.
I guess you could call the things zombies, but they were certainly more like the people in 28 days and 28 weeks later, except I have a feeling that they behaved more like wild animals in that there certainly seemed to be an alpha male who the rest of the pack followed. He was certainly the strongest of all the ones we have seen. All the victims seemed to have above normal strength though not just alpha male.
This is probably where the cuts in the movie hurt it the most, I am convinced we would have seen more. Will Smith's character seems to think they have lost all rational, but there were several moments in the movie, and not only by the uber zompire as you described him, that indicated they had some intelligence left.
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That settles it. I'm seeing the movie. It's good to know that if the primary plot fails I can still rely on some comedy relief for enjoyment.
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Fletcher wrote:
I was a little disappointed with the film after all the good stuff I'd heard about the novel. There are movies that make you turn your brain on and there are movies that make you turn your brain off. I was hoping this one would be in the former category.
I think I'll still get around to reading the book though.
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I loved the environments, liked the character, felt the plot was a bit absurd, and hated the actual infected people.
I think I'm extra inclined to like the environments, as I have a soft spot for apocalyptic visions of the future, and see a lot of those parts of New York every day. Seeing them decaying and overgrown was very cool.
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FWIW, I felt the book was the exact opposite, which is why I'm so ready to be disappointed with this film.
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Tetnis wrote:
The movie was very enjoyable(albeit quite depressing). It didn't stick to the novel very closely at all, but until I figure out how to do that spoiler thing I can't comment on it.
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To do a spoiler box, make a quote box with white text inside.
Like this, but with the "other" brackets:
Text goes in here
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I finished the book last month (It's great by the way).
Even though the movie wasn't exactly like the book, I think the liberties they took were alright. I would have loved for them to follow the book entirely, but they still managed to make a really good movie. One thing bothered me though:
All in all it was a great movie. It really made you care for the characters.
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Great environments, very nice character development. The wife and I saw this last night in a packed theater, and I very nearly decided against it due to the people in front of me who were also buying tickets to it (stereotypical loud black woman, equally loud black female friend, thug wanna-be husband, team of loud/annoying children). Thankfully they only lost control of their little hellions once during the movie.
Overall though, I really enjoyed the movie. Eventually I might get around to reading the book, just to see how it differs.
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I have to admit, when I read this line last night, I was laughing pretty hard.
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Saw the movie last night. I really enjoyed it alot. I'd agree with the rest about the last quarter of the movie or so. It went from A- in my book to a B- or so. Good, but kind of disappointing. My girlfriend who read the book, was pretty upset with it because of the ending. I dont know why they deviated from the ending, sticking with the ending of the book would have given us a really unique movie that'd stick out for years to come, other than kinda feeling like an American 28 days later.
Oh, and Will Smith is awesome. I was wondering how he'd do in this movie, but from the first scene where's he's hunting deer. The look in his eyes as he aims his rifle, the desperation and hint of sadness convinced me instantly, and I was didn't look at him out of character for the rest of the movie. He had a bunch of powerful scenes with just his facial expressions. If the movie kept the pace it was going at, i'd say he'd have an oscar shot.
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Thanks. Anyway, about the book:
"Everyone's always in favour of saving Hitler's brain but when you put it in the body of a great white shark, ooh, suddenly you've gone too far."
Wait, I don't remember what happened exactly.
"We prefer to be called the swarm of his dark lord, the thief in the night Boogle." - Boogle
I don't know then, I'll go look later.
By the way, READ THE BOOK. No matter how much I enjoyed the movie, the book wins by a landslide. Matheson's depth and artistic show of emotion really encompasses you. It's only 170 pages, and worth every one.
"Everyone's always in favour of saving Hitler's brain but when you put it in the body of a great white shark, ooh, suddenly you've gone too far."
Will Smith did an amazing job. I've always liked him when he was playing the straight guy and not trying to be all funny/hip.
We got our first IMAX screen here locally and we saw it on that. I thought the additional price might deter some of the worse of the crowds but i lost count of all the 4-10 year olds. It's pathetic all the dead beat parents that ended up having to leave 1/2 way through because junior was scared sh*tless.
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I say "good riddance". I can't count how many crucial emotional scenes have been ruined in theatre because some parents brought their toddler to a showing of something that is obviously not Disney or Pixar. I know some parents don't have anyone to babysit but seriously.. don't ruin a good night for everyone else around you. It's annoying and rude.
Yet even then we ran like the wind,
whilst our laughter echoed under cerulean skies...
haha! I have seen the movie this weekend as well. The book is completely different but the movie is very good on its own. Its more of a based on then a movie about or an adaptation.
There was a dead beat parent that brought a 2 year old so of course when the scary monster would come on the screen the poor kid would start crying. Many a person told the lady to get out and bring the kid back when he was old enough.. but she just sat there.. at one point she cover the mouth with her hand to get him to shutup it was crazy
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Exactly the reason I prefer the "movie theatre" in my basement any day over the actual theatre. I'll admit there's certain movies that just seem better when you have a big audience and reactions (ie, Snakes on a Plane.. not a great movie, but seeing it in the theatre and having some audience participation made it seem better). But when I saw I Am Legend over the weekend there were 4 teenage girls up at the very front that burst out laughing when Will Smith was doing his pullups (I'm assuming one of them made some comment to another about how ripped he was) and as mentioned above by other people, they were loudly giggling during some emotional scenes
I usually wait to see these types of movies well into their showing and during odd times hoping the theatre will be mostly empty, but this was one I didn't want to wait for so I put up with it.
-edit-
And I suppose I should comment on the movie itself. It doesn't follow the book at all. There's some similarities obviously, but they're pretty minor. But judging the movie on it's own I thought it was pretty great. I agree with the others that it seemed to switch gears towards the end. It was like an hour and 20 minutes into the movie they suddenly realized "oh no! We've barely shown the vampires.. quick let's come up with some scenes so we can throw in hundreds and hundreds of vampires.. and then we can blow them up! Where's Michael Bay?!?" (and I'll just point out that Michael Bay really was attached to this project at some point.. probably back when it still had Schwarzenegger set as the lead) It did seem like there was a lot cut, especially regarding the alpha vampire. I look forward to the 2 1/2 hour directors cut DVD (just speculating). And hopefully, some day someone will make a true adaptation of the book.
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Seems like every theatre had someone who laughed during scene sam.
Mine did too.
I made several rude comments after the showing.
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The only thing I can really think of is that it was an exceedingly intense and emotional scene and was done so well that it made a lot of people extremely uncomfortable, to which there only reaction was to laugh. I've witnessed a lot of people react in strange ways to things that make them uncomfortable and laughing inappropriately seems to be the number one reaction.
Mr T broke the speed of light in the A-Team van because he wanted to prove that quantum physics was a bunch of Jibba Jabba.