Directed by:
Francis LawrenceCinematography:
Andrew LesnieComposer:
James Newton HowardCast:
Will Smith, Alice Braga, Charlie Tahan, Salli Richardson-Whitfield, Willow Smith, Darrell Foster, April Grace, Dash Mihok, Steve Cirbus, Emma Thompson (more)VOD (4)
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The last man on earth is not alone. Will Smith plays that lone survivor in I Am Legend, the action epic fusing heart-pounding excitement with a mind-blowing vision of a desolated Manhattan. Somehow immune to an unstoppable, incurable virus, military virologist Robert Neville (Smith) is now the last human survivor in New York City and maybe the world. Mutant plague victims lurk in the shadows... watching Neville’s every move... waiting for him to make a fatal mistake. Neville is driven by only one remaining mission: to find an antidote using his own immune blood. But he knows he is outnumbered... and quickly running out of time. (Warner Bros. Home Entertainment)
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Reviews (13)
I would have expected Akiva Goldsman to choose deeper material for his screenplay. On the other hand, he’s also the executive producer, who knows very well that to get a successful blockbuster, it is enough to develop a good premise into a superficial story, provide it with cool set designs and put Will Smith’s face on the posters. I Am Legend is the perfect commercial product. But if you want to see its premise reach its full potential, watch instead the tense and chilling 30 Days of Night, followed by the intelligent and technically advanced Children of Men.
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Atmospherically, it's an excellently executed piece of work, which, despite several undeniable virtues and innovations, unfortunately doesn't quite work. The depopulated New York is captivating, but the cause of that smacks of sloppy work and is very sketchy. The atmosphere is gripping, just like the sound effects with outdoor noises and echoes throughout the night. The villains on the other hand, are so awkward. They look very digital, meditating in an abandoned house without reacting to light for a moment, then behaving like a hungry pack with a brain the size of a pea, and in a moment, the leader (WTF?) throws orders and gestures cheerfully and without inhibitions. We actually learn absolutely nothing about their intelligence, strength, and way of life. Everything revolves only around the attempt to save and the abandoned Will Smith, who is excellent. The ending is predictably predictable and it remains to be stated that I Am Legend will not be a legend.
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A wasted opportunity that Francis Lawrence, Will Smith, the almost omnipresent atmosphere and primarily the opening thirty minutes mange to save by the skin of their teeth. It’s just that after that it has nothing more to offer. The befuddled result isn’t due to the absence of action or the somewhat laughable monsters. The blame falls on the screenwriters’ heads. I will ignore that the only thing that remained of the book is the initial idea, but nobody try to tell me that the screenplay for the hundred minutes of running time was more than three pages long. Shame on them if they wanted to get paid for it too. When nothing at all happens, not even the undeniable charisma of Will Smith can do much to save things. What makes it even worse is the utterly ridiculous ending (the “alternative", faithful to the spirit of the book makes the movie much better). A blockbuster that isn’t a popcorn and where you can hear the thoughts of (not only) Bob Marley. That’s a big plus. But the fact that in the end this is just an average watch, is no big plus at all.
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I'm going to be brutally honest. I Am Legend is a stupidly written and routinely filmed B-movie that has nothing to offer besides decent post-apocalyptic visuals. I don't know anything more cliché than the motif of a destructive virus that turns humanity into an army of bloodthirsty mutated zombies - and here, diplomatically speaking, it is handled unoriginally. Nothing is clever in this film. Will Smith doesn't even manage the minimum of psychological acting that is required of him, and it is better not to contemplate the existence of the depicted world and the behavior of the hero of the story. The idyllic community of survivors with a pristine white church in the middle felt more like a raised middle finger to me. The film is an easily forgettable endeavor only worthy of being broadcast on late-night TV. Overall impression: 25%.
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Right after setting my noise interference device to channel 4, I was engulfed in the great atmosphere of an empty New York. The scenery is really impressive and the silence, the silence (even above my noise interferer, the sound of crunching potato chips and giggling) is chilling. Frances Lawrence really approached this from the right direction. Will Smith acts very convincingly, despite the role not being... let’s say, right for him. Especially in the second half he shows that he is able to be serious too. As for the “vampires" or, if you will, the light-shy, I’m convinced that people in makeup could never look so vacant and inhuman. I certainly understand Lawrence’s idea to do them digitally, because like this they really terrified me. Even though I admit that they were far from perfect. But what prevents me from giving it five stars is the fact that the screenplay begins (especially toward the end) to behave too “American" and changes from before unseen into a clichéd genre with an inevitable ending. This might have worked before, but today at least I am unimpressed. Can’t a movie just end normally? And they should have translated the title in Czech properly. I’m adamant about that.
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Gallery (77)
Photo © Warner Bros. Pictures
![I Am Legend - Photos](http://image.pmgstatic.com/cache/resized/w663/files/images/film/photos/159/890/159890593_e824bc.png)
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