I is Legend

This weekend Mel and I went and saw I am Legend. To be honest I was a little bored by it. Will Smith is good. I read a few reviews before I saw the movie and most of them trend toward agreeing that Will Smith is one of those actors that can carry a movie on his own. By one of those actors, I guess they mean a good actor. It's not like he's some kind of genius because he can hold my attention is a decaying Manhattan for 45 minutes. I can sit in my backyard and watch squirrels chase each other for forty five minutes. Let's not make a god out of him quite yet.

The CGI graphics could have been better (especially that lion). Occasionally the cityscape looked realistic but I didn't really see too much that I hadn't seen in the trailer. In that way it reminded me of the 1930's Manhattan that was created for Peter Jackson's King Kong. Both look nice but not much was done with them. Most of what we see of Manhattan in Legend is an early scene where Will Smith is cruising around in a Mustang named after Melanie's sister. Good clean fun, sure, but you can see most of that scene for free on Youtube.

I think what disappointed me the most was how little interaction there was between Smith's character and those unfortunate creatures that he shares the city with. Say what you want about Omega Man but I really like the conflict between Heston's character and the night creatures. In Omega Man they were intelligent. In I am Legend they show glimmers of intelligence but that conflict is not pursued like I was wishing. We see a few shots of an infected human that is portrayed as being a leader of the infected masses but the movie doesn't explore that. There was your movie, not the arrival of two other immune humans and some mythical safe harbor that they can flee to.

As far as movies about an apocalypse I think I would have been better off watching The Postman again.