*** Official I AM LEGEND Discussion Thread (1 Viewer)

[Paul D G]

Saw this the other today. Shame they didn't go with this instead of the bad CGI creatures.

 

[Aaron Silverman]

I thought this movie was decent. It certainly has very little to do with the theme of the book (which I have read).


But. . .that alternate ending was so bad it made me tear up with laughter. Not only is it inherently silly, it's so disconnected from the rest of the movie (in terms of the behavior of the creatures) as to be completely nonsensical. I really don't understand why people prefer it.

 

[Will_B]

Because it makes sense, whereas the theatrical end doesn't.

 

[Will_B]

Maybe you're thinking of the theatrical end as the alternate end,. and vice versa. The end that makes sense is the one in which Will Smith realizes that he has become like a vampire to those creatures, stealing away them one by one, and finally having stolen the pack's girlfriend (remember earlier in the film when he went into their building after his dog, he encountered the males in a circle being, um, serviced by her). He realizes that they are a species and he's been intruding.


The ending that makes no sense is the one where everything just blows up, Michael Bay style.

 

[Chuck Anstey]

Originally Posted by Will_B

Maybe you're thinking of the theatrical end as the alternate end,. and vice versa. The end that makes sense is the one in which Will Smith realizes that he has become like a vampire to those creatures, stealing away them one by one, and finally having stolen the pack's girlfriend (remember earlier in the film when he went into their building after his dog, he encountered the males in a circle being, um, serviced by her). He realizes that they are a species and he's been intruding.

That ending makes no sense in the context of the film was was shot, which is the only standard by which the ending should be judged. There was nothing in the movie except the one car-trap copycat scene that indicates the creatures are anything more than humans devolved into base animals. If the first 90 minutes of the movie had been like the book then the alternate ending would have fit better, but it wasn't. The alternate ending is a total WTF? ending for anyone not familiar with the book. I'm not saying the theatrical ending was all that great but it was more consistent with the rest of the movie.

 

[Will_B]

Sorry, never read the book. But Will Smith conveyed the meaning of the ending when he stares at the Polaroids on his wall. And that "one" car-trap copycat scene IS the scene that shows that they still have intelligence. How many more times would they have had to trap him to make that point? It's a good movie, not a great one, but the "blows up real good" ending doesn't fit the rest of film either, imo.

 

[Will_B]

Wait. Here's the thing. You are correct that the last scene doesn't "fit" the rest of the film -- because it is a moment of revelation, where everything that preceded it is thrown into a new light, a new perspective. Everything we thought we were seeing up until then was wrong. They weren't just monsters. They were monsters with feelings. Sing it with me. Feelings. Nothing more than feelings... So in that sense, yes, the last scene strikes a different tone. But that is on purpose, to make that revelation about how everything we saw up until then was not quite as black and white as we'd thought, or what Will Smith's character had thought.

 

[Aaron Silverman]

Chuck is right on here. At no time do the vampires behave like anything beyond psychotic, screaming, bloodthirsty animals, with the very slight exception of that one scene where they display a wee ounce of intelligence -- an ounce of intelligence used to try and capture Will Smith. Then at the end they're suddenly all lovey-dovey. "WTF" is putting it *very* mildly.


The theatrical ending may not be terribly clever, but it certainly makes more sense in the context of what came before.


When a movie has a twist or revelation at the end, it still has to make logical sense in retrospect. This one (the alternate ending) doesn't. The one scene with the trap doesn't lay enough groundwork to offset all the other scenes that don't display any evidence of higher function by the vampires. I guess the filmmakers were more interested in visceral action and scares than in the themes of the original story.

 

[Will_B]

But it wasn't just a mere copy of Smith's trap, was it? They'd also observed his visits to the video store, and took one of the mannequins he interacts with. That's the beginning of the realization. The mannequin's appearance is so out of place that it literally almost makes Smith's character think that he has gone insane, because there is NO WAY that mannequin could have walked there on its own... and the other possibility, that the creatures moved it, seemingly does not even occur to him, or at least, seems less likely than the possibility that he has gone mad. A few minutes later we see the creatures have domesticated animals, too. I'm not sure if we see the leader of the pack (the creatures -- vampire-zombie-people I mean) at that point in the film but I think maybe we do, showing they have hierarchy.


But in general I agree, the filmmakers were more interested in visceral thrills than in the themes of the original story, which is probably why they chucked out the ending in favor of the blow-em-up ending.

 

[Radioman970]

I like the blow up ending the best. He saves the girl and kid so humanity will have some hope. I'm not into the revelation that they have intelligence.


I went with what the film tells us: humans down to the basic functionality, kind of like zombies but more mobile.

I like this film a lot. Seen it about 3 times, 2 on DVD and 1 on Bluray just recently. Might be partial to Vincent Price, but this is second way ahead of Heston. I like Smith's performance throughout. He shows some good acting ability here.

The part with the dog used to bother me...but I kind of sort of get it. Til the end he was hoping it wouldn't happen but it did. So he took care of it the only way he could at the time. I would have liked something different...

yeah, Smith's character is kind of losing it later in the film. That's actually clear. the feeling of despair is apparent, but they did that better in the Price version. Damn, that film was depressing! All those trips to the dump. Not sure why they didn't do more of that in the Smith film.

 

[Aaron Silverman]

Steve, if you really want some thought-provoking material along those lines, check out the original book. The title is "I Am Legend." It's often included in story compilations because it's relatively short.


The author, Richard Matheson, is very creative (and has had a number of movies made from his stories).

 

[Radioman970]

^ not to mention LOTS of the better Twilight Zone episodes.