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Critics Consensus: I Am Legend overcomes questionable special effects and succeeds largely on the strength of Will Smith's mesmerizing performance.
Critic Consensus: I Am Legend overcomes questionable special effects and succeeds largely on the strength of Will Smith's mesmerizing performance.
All Critics (210) | Top Critics (48) | Fresh (145) | Rotten (65) | DVD (13)
Smith turns in a terrific performance, nailing Neville's angst while allowing room for humor.
When they do, banging their heads against plate glass as movie zombies always do, I started needing something else to think about.
I wouldn't dream of giving away the ending, but it's not likely to satisfy either the action crowd or Matheson fans.
I Am Legend is a grenade that goes off when least expected. It has more horror than heart, but it is never boring.
So often, sci-fi is overproduced, but I Am Legend doesn't look like a CGI extravaganza. It looks like an edgy suspense movie shot on the fly in New York City after the fall. And because of that, it's all the more effective.
You're left gawping at $100 million-worth of eye-popping futuristic B-movie.
...the film's final act turn towards quick, out of nowhere resolutions, hokey attempts at evocations of faith, and a rapid increase of sentimental slop does much to undercut "I Am Legend"'s excellent, forlorn first half.
If you ignore its flaws, I am Legend can be enjoyed as the perfect brainless Boxing Day blockbuster - but it is essentially a leftover festive turkey.
It's a better-than-average blockbuster, which sweeps around some large ideas and interesting themes, but never delves for long enough to make this film a true classic.
Inevitably, ideas give way to special-effects
I Am Legend is three film genres for the price of one: Science Fiction, Action, and Horror, and while it's no classic in any one arena it remains edgy fun.
This is no graphic shoot-'em-up but an intelligent, if sometimes sentimental, exploration of human decency and responsibility that ponders the limits of rationality and faith.
This post-apocalyptic zombie-based film is strong thanks to in part the special effect/CGI work as well as the strong lead of Will Smith. I Am Legend is graphic in the realms of loneliness and isolation and makes a solid film for audiences to enjoy. 4/5
Super Reviewer
Will Smith stars as a military researcher who is seemingly the last person left on Earth trying to find the cure for an engineered retro virus that has decimated the human population and turned many into mindless killing machines. It seems to me that the reason a lot of people slated this film was solely because it was not a faithful adaptation of the book it takes its name from. I personally haven't read it and to be honest I don't care if it's faithful or not. A carbon copy adaptation of a book does not necessarily make a good film and vice versa; the two are completely different media. The fact is that I found this pretty enjoyable. Will Smith is quite convincing as a man suffering the loneliness of total isolation and the scenes in the first hour of the film when the "enemy" is still unseen are very effective. It's therefore a pity that it descends into the usual CGI infested Hollywood claptrap for the final half hour. It reminded me of 28 Days Later because of the similar scenario and unfortunately it suffers from the same problem; the set up is great but it didn't seem to know where to go from there. Once the mother and son characters appeared it turned into a dodgy CGI-laden shoot em up and became far less interesting, but it's definitely worth a watch for the earlier scenes. Some of the plot elements are not properly explained and the ending is a little weak, but not bad as a whole.
It was thrilling and captivating to watch the first time around. Afterwards the flaws became extremely apparent, yet were eclipsed at times by Will Smith's excellent acting and infusion of humor despite the film's dark themes.
i loved this movie. will smith did an excellent job and the film flowed well. no time was wasted on the meaningless, i felt that every scene was essential. to see smith create community with dummies and risk his life for his dog shows humanities need for relationship. this is defintely one of the better films of 2007.
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