17 December 2007

"I Am Legend" Smashes Box Office, Gives Warm Fuzzy Feeling

Vampire flick "I Am Legend" reeled in 76.5M on opening weekend , supposedly making it the number one December opening ever.

Meanwhile, I am sitting back in my chair, shaking my head.

I know I'm a harsh critic, and I know the movie was going to be different than the book, but consider these things.

1. This movie was already made. It was called "28 Days Later" which was not based on a book and already did a great job of rejuvinating the zombie genre.

2. The ending of the book is not "Hollywood", so they had to change it to one of those warm, fuzzy, "hope goes on" endings. I'm sick of Hollywood treating all of us like 10 year olds that need a happy ending, but I guess that's what happens when 25% of the U.S. has not read a single book in the last year. Endings aren't always happy. I'd much rather have a sad-ending thinker movie than a plotless action flick, but I guess the opening numbers for the weekend say otherwise for the general population.

3. The best scene in the entire movie is the most tragic, occurs only about halfway through the movie and has little to do with the rest of the plot.

4. The vampires in the book could talk and were generally sentient, not just brainless monsters. The movie shows a glimmer of this and then disregards it for the rest of the movie. It also half-asses the fact that one vampire seems to know the main character...but since they can't talk, that kind of all goes out the window.

5. They bring God into the last quarter of the movie for no reason whatsoever. This was non-existant in the book. I don't have any personal quarrel with God, but in this case it was utterly superfluous.

6. His reason for being "Legend" in the movie sucks.

Just...step away from your car and go read the book instead. It'll be just as much as a movie ticket, but more enjoyable and thought-provoking. Plus, you can always donate it to your local library when you're done and let someone else discover the joys of reading a book. Plus, the proceeds of the book don't support the MPAA. What other reasons do you need?

Except you, the one that wants the happy fuzzy ending. You can go see the movie.

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1 Comments:

Anonymous Anonymous said...

What gets me the most, I think, is how they changed the ending. The first 2/3 of the movie wasn't the same as the book, but it honestly wasn't bad. But then it's all downhill. The ending in the book is where the title I am Legend comes from. Originally it was a tragic, oh-shit kind of ending. But it was *good*.

This story is thought to be excellent by many like Stephen King and other horror/sci-fi writers. It's been made into a movie four times now -- each time changing it so much it's hardly the original story. Why can't they just do it right?

1:58 PM  

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