Excellent until it starts moving the narrative beyond a concept and stumbles and falls badly

Rating: Null/10 (17 February 2008)

Cancer has been cured by genetically modifying the measles virus to benefit mankind  the results are impressive. However the downside is that the virus mutates killing 90% of humanity, turning 9% into light-phobic monsters and leaving only 1% untouched due to natural immunity. Robert Neville is one of that 1% and also the military biochemist charged with stopping the virus but he has failed and now is the only person alive in what remains of NYC. Working on a cure in his basement and broadcasting fruitlessly into the sky, Neville spends his days surviving and his nights hiding.
Despite my fear of most zombie style films, I came to I Am Legend drawn mostly by the interest in the effects. Having been impressed by an empty London in 28 Days Later, I was curious to see what more money could do. In terms of impact the answer is "the same" but in terms of scale it is "much more". New York looks amazing and even those who only know it from films will feel the emptiness of the place. The irony is that, due to the sheer scale of it, visually it looks "unreal" whereas the smaller scale 28 Days Later was just plain eerie as it involved nothing generated by computer. This will sound like a criticism but it is not because I do think that this sense of emptiness is the thing that makes I Am Legend excellent for part of the running time.
The effects are only part of it but roundly the delivery makes this aspect work. The plot sits back and lets us just be with Neville in his isolation and semi-madness; talking to manikins, treating his dog as a child and so on. This is greatly helped by a performance from Will Smith that is close to towering; he is utterly convincing in his character and the film brings us an understand of his situation gradually. As we get used to his eccentric lifestyle, the reality is brought home in a moment where he goes from sun to a sweat soaked scene in a dark room, a brilliant moment where we the audience experience the fear he is living with first hand.
So why is the film itself not brilliant? Well, this comes down to the second half or so where the writers start to take steps to bring out a narrative that will go somewhere in the traditional sense rather than exploring the character of Neville as its sole reason for being. In doing this the script made many jumps that were convenient, illogical or just plain lazy and it is disappointing. Bear in mind that this is a film that had managed to convince me that the majority of humanity was dead due to Emma Thompson, the man responsible for finding the cure was one of the few left alive and that New York was completely empty  I never questioned any of this so how much of a dropped ball is it to suddenly introduce a narrative that has the audience looking at each other saying "yeah right"? It is not as bad as I make it sound though because at this point the action steps up and provides sufficient noise and explosions that perhaps many viewers will find themselves distracted away from the problems with the story telling. However these are too obvious and too big and contrast badly with the patience and emptiness of the first half and, with the rush to a conclusion the film does really feel like the majority of the work was done on the concept and this plot was an afterthought. The writers don't help themselves with some of the dialogue anyway. Having got it so perfect with so little early on, a massive shoehorn is used to get Bob Marley in there  one of several things that conspire to undermine all the good character development that had been done in the first half.
Overall though the film is worth seeing. The first half is very impressive thanks to patience, special effects and a very strong turn from Smith. Sadly the second half lets it all down as the plot devices used to provide a tradition flow and ending are clumsy and unconvincing and the noisy action sequences that are produced didn't manage to distract me from them.