Much ado about nothing

Rating: 5/10 (6 April 2010)

*Eventual spoilers are mild and consumer-friendly*
Early on, I am Legend gives out several promises that it can't live up to. The post-apocalyptic story of the life of the one man left alive after the big wipeout - based on Richard Matheson's novel of the same name, already filmed twice in The Last Man on Earth in 1964 and The Omega Man in 1971, both films superior to this - will make you ask questions. Will Smith seems to be the sole survivor on the planet or, at least on Manhattan. He's driving around in the inner city wasteland in a scene that admittedly isn't totally unique nowadays, but nevertheless quite impressive. Several things come to mind. Why is he immune? If he has survived, surely others must? Why are animals not affected? What's his history? What happened to his family? What was his occupation? How does he function now? Also, we learn early on that this all has something to do with a positive cure for cancer discovered a couple of years prior. Emma Thompson has a cameo in the beginning as the guilty scientist. Another question - Will she turn up again? None of these questions are properly answered. Sure, answers are mentioned, either by the characters or in brief visual moments by the film itself, but we are far from closure. To begin with, the movie quickly falls into Silent Hill territory when we become aware of some scary nocturnal creatures that adds to the mystery we already have in front of us. The identity of these monsters are explained by Will Smith in one (1) monologue. Why he is immune is not explained. We don't get to know much at all about who he is and what he was doing prior to the apocalypse. His wife and family appear in brief flashbacks. Their fate is dealt with as if censored from the movie. The cancer origin thing is still unknown. Will Smith attempts to find a cure to the apocalyptic virus. It goes bad until it goes well. And no, I don't know what Emma Thompson was doing in the beginning of the movie.
By the third part of the movie, I realised I didn't really cared about it. The screenplay, by Akiva Goldsman and Mark Protosevich, is filled with nice-sounding lines that are supposed to explain Will Smith's character, but when the time comes for the movie to get closer to it's finale it turns out it can't walk the walk at all. There's no psychology to the character, which is a pity given that Will Smith is really doing his very best as an actor, and there's no proper reality in the situation of the movie either. Early on, we get the idea of a movie that knows what it's doing but all we really get in the end is a bunch of loose ends. All in all, if a moody Will Smith and CGI ghouls is all you require for your science fiction entertainment, you might enjoy this in quite an uncomplicated way. I can't see how it's about much else. And, well, there you have it.