Going mad in an empty New York

Rating: 8/10 (1 June 2012)

I thought this was a decent science-fiction movie for two reasons in particular.
First, Will Smith delivers a great performance. What would happen to someone who had survived the horror of an apocalypse and was left alone for three years? Smith gives us a good idea.
Second, the post-apocalyptic scenes of an empty New York were particularly interesting. (Since 2007, however, the History channel has broadcast their series on "Life After People" so this no longer comes across as a novel movie concept.)
I admire the producers for avoiding a cliché ending, but still....it wasn't satisfying.
Despite the appropriation of the name, this movie departs significantly from the Richard Matheson novel. If you prefer movies that are faithful to the book, don't see this one. The earlier movies on the same theme had faded from memory, so I saw it as a fresh concept. I was actually surprised at the direction this movie took.
It's interesting to me that this popular movie, released about five years ago, has practically the same score on IMDb.com and RottenTomatoes.com.
The IMDb user score is currently 71%. The audience rating on RT is 69%, but the average is 72%. Not that different.
IMDb's "metascore" (which is based on 37 critic reviews provided by Metacritic.com) assigns it a score of 65%. On RT the "Tomatometer" is at 70%, although the "average score" is 64%. These scores are based on published movie reviews. Again, not that different.
The statistics on both these sites are based on a huge number of user ratings and dozens of movie reviews.
There are only 8 points between the lowest and highest score. Should I be surprised that these scores are so uniform five years after the movie was first released? The popular scores (around 69%) are a little better than the reviewer scores. But not by much. There doesn't seem to be much difference. I wonder whether this is common.
Movie goers often go for high and low scores when they rate movies: they give it a 10 if they love it; 0 if not. I wonder how much this voting dynamic affects the final scores? Perhaps in the end this is what makes user scores different from movie review scores.
And why do I feel that my score should be higher than the one that has emerged after five years out of hundreds of thousands of ratings? I suppose it's because I love science fiction. I am also forgiving of plot holes, science problems and lack of realism. As long as a movie is entertaining, has a few neat concepts and a character worth caring about, I'm willing to forgive almost anything.