Good fun but it could have been Great

Rating: 6/10 (16 December 2007)

First lets start with the good: Will Smith's performance. Is there anything this guy can't do? For sure there are a lot of haters out there but how can any of them argue that his portrayal of loneliness and madness in the face of isolation from a world that once looked up to him and now wants to tear him apart is anything but genuine? You believe, through his interactions with his dog and the ruins that was once New York City (including some mannequins), that he is in fact the only man who walks the Earth. His portrayal of Neville is easy to connect with the audience because of his compassionate drive to save humanity. An interesting thing to note is "Omega Man" Charleton Heston's portrayal of Neville was almost the complete opposite, but good nonetheless. Heston's was arrogant, and although he was also working on a cure, he seemed to be comfortable with the isolation.
Regardless, Will Smith actually saved this film. Why? Because once we start to interact with the zombies we realize that they're nothing but a bunch of cartoons ripped straight out of a first person shooter video game. How can the same film have amazing cgi that transformed NYC into a port-apocalyptic nightmare and then have cheap cgi of zombies that look like something out the movie "Mummy"? I can understand it if they used cgi for background zombies but why not have real human actors with real good make-up and costumes for the foreground, especially for the leader?! I can buy that the cartoonish quality of the zombies helps in Neville's and our disassociation with them. I mean how could we possibly sympathize with them when they're obviously not even real? But had they been real actors there could have been a more interesting interaction between Neville and them (watch Omega Man to see how they pulled that off in that department but please ignore the cheesy afro).
Also take into consideration that these creatures are the result of a virus that has made their skin vulnerable to sunlight, wouldn't it stand to chance that they might also be physically weak as well(the leader smashing the glass with his FACE)? And why are they suddenly so acrobatic or nimble if you will if they weren't that way in normal life? Even if one argues that the zombies have resorted back to the primitive mind why would they be so mindless? Are they dead? I say mindless because for the most part they run about, smacking into one another, killing themselves to kill Neville acting like a pack a wolves and yet they own and I assume feed and train dogs? Are these the same zombies that tricked Neville with the Mannequin trap? Give me a break.
I must first admit that I was looking forward to this film and had high hopes for it so there is no doubt that I hyped it up a bit much. Even though I feel they dropped the ball with the end of the second act and the third (the ending was rushed) I still enjoyed the film. It could have been so much better or at least an improvement on Omega Man, but it is still thrilling and enjoyable and smarter than most of the summer popcorn films. And at the rate these studios are turning out one bad over budgeted film after another it is with a sigh of relief that this film is not one of them.