I Am Legend

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. (05/07/2008)

The first half is excellent, with a very good portrayal of a depopulated New York, Will Smith is brilliant and we don’t get to see much of the infected. But in the second half, when they start showing up more often and in their full glory, the quality declines because their CGI look is really not good. Also, the screenwriter deserves to be punched in the face for that ending. The rating is between 3 and 4 stars. (02/01/2008)

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. (26/01/2008)

Lawrence confirms his reputation as a versatile director, but unlike Constantin, he also lost a less quality screenplay with a higher budget. Mainly because of it, the excellent action and grand yet suffocating atmosphere are somewhat wasted. Some compromise is missing here at least. The line between drama and sci-fi spectacle is very winding here, confusing the viewer with transitions from bombastic yet "only" personal scenes to occasionally intimately portrayed fights. The biggest betrayal of the story is ultimately the whole theme. It mixes 28 Days Later, Day of the Triffids, Planet of the Apes, and other battles of individuals against a mass of enemies, but the trailer promised much more than that. A satisfying conclusion and some ideological depth were sought in vain here. (13/01/2008)

In an amazing opening that reminds us that Lawrence is simply talented, you don't even think that a monumental betrayal is about to happen. The director is innocent in this because having to make something out of Akiva Goldsman's scripted nothingness is unenviable. It does give a few scenes a proper edge, and Will Smith's charisma works quite well, even if he’s not exactly comfortable in the dramatic scenes. However, the rest of it is a drawn-out boring 100 minutes. This was supposed to be a two-and-a-half-hour drama with proper action and fancy special effects, not a big-budget theatrical play with no balls. Someone forgot how to work with dramaturgy and let the creators of post-apocalyptic sci-fi and family soap opera onto the same set. This year, no film deserves the label of disappointment more than this one. (27/12/2007)