I Am Legend: Faithful Adaptation?

I am Legend is an incredibly insightful, brilliant, genre-changing masterpiece that is as scary as it is intellegent.

Of course, I am not talking about the movie. No, I am talking about a short novel released in 1954 by Richard Matheson. It tells the story of a the last man on Earth. But he is not at peace. Every living soul has been transformed into zombie-like vampires, and they gather around his house every night, screaming for his blood. He spends his nights penned up, praying for daylight to come, and his days hunting them, finding their comatose bodies and driving stakes through their hearts, and also finding the cause of the plague. Sounds a lot like the movie of the same name, eh? THAT'S BECAUSE IT'S BASED ON THE BOOK! Yup, and they aren't even vampires in the movie.

The movie I Am Legend is a new film from Francis Lawrence, director of a film I feel to be grossly underrated, Constantine. (Despite it's many blasphemies) The film chronicles Robert Neville's stuggle to survive in a New York City that is completely deserted... except for an army of crazed mutant cannibals.

A cure for cancer has been found, and it seems to be the greatest breakthrough in medicine since the cowpox annoculation. However, it has the unfortunate side effect of making the user EXTREMELY sensitive to sunlight... and quite hungry for human flesh. The medicine creates a plague that ravishes New York City, and causes the military to attempt a quarantine of the island of manhattan by destroying the bridges leading out. Military scientist Robert Neville has an immunity, though, and so he and his dog, Sam, spend their time looking for food, keeping entertained, and surviving.

The first differece a reader of the book may notice becomes obvious at the very start of the movie. The plague is the result of a virus created by man, while in the book, it is a naturally found bacteria, or a bacillus to be more percise. The next differece is that Robert Neville is black. No, I am not racist, but that doesn't exactly justify the decision to cast a black actor in the role of a white character. What DOES justify that is his incredible acting ability. I cried in this movie. I really did. Will Smith is one of the greatest actors of our time, and he did an incredible job acting here.

The movie's atmosphere is incredible, as I expected after finding out that the film would share a director with Constantine. While the CG isn't the greatest in the world, it is still fairly impressive and very stylized. There are scenes that make you feel like they actually evacuated NYC to film the movie, which brings me to my next comparison of the book: setting. The book takes place in Los Angeles. Why the change? The reason is that the director felt that NYC would A)Allow them to attatch more emotion to a deserted city and B) allow them to isolate the main character more. (Island - bridges = no way out on foot) I don't mind this change, and I agree with it from a directorial standpoint.

Another diference is the dog. in the book, the time from when Robert first finds the dog and when the dog dies (Note that it is a small black dog rather than a german shepard) is only a few pages. It has a very tiny role in the book. In the movie, however, Neville's dog, Sam, is present from the start, and has a very large role. I agreed with this change as well, as they need to show Nevilles thoughts somehow, and narration doesn't fly much with today's audiences. There is only one bit of "narration", and it is actually a recording that is sent out via radio in a continuous loop. Also, it adds a great deal of emotional impact to the film.


Overall, this film exceeded my expectations. I hate it and love it at the same time. It would have been better if they had tried to do an adaptation of the book more than a remake of Omega Man, and I am very unhappy that they changed the plague's origin (Taking away the vampires and the nocturnal humans, such as Ruth, makes the title's meaning less of a suprise)

I say this to you: READ THE FUCKING BOOC BEFORE YOU SEE THIS FILM, and please, for your own sake, get a copy with a regular cover, not one with Will Smith on the cover.

I give the film a 8/10.