SuperSatellite ||

Remember that movie I Am Legend that came out over the holidays? Remember how angry I was at it? Obviously there’s no need for me to rehash the pain and suffering that the ending of that movie caused me. It was a good movie through the first half, acceptable in the third quarter, and viciously worthless in the last quarter.

Really, it was a movie that I think would have benefited greatly the closer it stuck to the original plot, modernization not withstanding. It had a great setting, spectacular acting (why wasn’t Will Smith nominated for Best Actor at the Oscar’s?), and a good feel to it (though I question the quality of the vampires’ CG). The framework Matheson provided was perfect. And they screwed it up. End of story.

Well, it turns out there was an alternate ending. Firstshowing.net mentioned it this morning. Turns out, it actually is better (and blog chatter seems to agree with that across the board). Here, watch, and then continue reading:

Better, no? Better, but not as good as it could have been. It still ignores the key point that (spoiler, highlight to read) Neville was the last man on earth. That was the whole friggin’ point. But at least that alternate ending attempted to give the vampires some additional organized creepy feel. In the book, the vampires were much more humanized, and in the end you almost sympathize with them. The movie had none of that. And this alternate dropped that cheesy as all hell ending where the woman and kid find the town full of people, which was about the most cookie cutter, generic, bad Hollywood ending I have ever seen in a movie. It didn’t even feel remotely natural, more like some random producer just thought it’d be fun to screw up the movie.

Too bad they hadn’t gone with this ending in the first place. I am vaguely reminded of the director’s cut of Independence Day, where the theatrical version was better, because what was in the director’s cut was pretty much trash. It’s like that, only backwards. The stuff they left in I Am Legend is all the stuff that would have been better off out. My question is, what happens next? Should I buy the DVD anyway? It’d be nice if you could watch it with the alternate ending instead, as some DVDs do. That’d be okay I guess. I wonder if Warner Bros. pays attention to any of the blog chatter on matters such as this.

Okay, I need to put an important preface here.  Prior to today, I was very enthusiastic about I Am Legend.  Firstshowing.net discussed it the other day, and I made it a point to defend it there, even having not seen it.  I find it very important to understand that movies can be (loosely) based on books, or adapted directly from them.  I, Robot is a great example.  While it wasn’t like the book, it was a good movie that had been based on it.  Blade Runner, and The Shawshank Redemption are others.  The Green Mile is a fantastic adaptation, on the other hand, being very nearly exactly like the book.  So I knew not to expect the book here, since it was clearly only based on it.  I knew it was only respinning the story, and I felt it was a good story that would modernize and expand well.

And god am I pissed.

I actually cannot remember the last time a movie pissed me off this badly.  I’m pretty sure it was because I was so ready to give it the benefit of the doubt, and so ready to enjoy it even as different as it might be.  I feel horribly betrayed.  This movie was likened to Cast Away, in how it was all on Will Smith’s shoulders.  I hated Cast Away, too, but for totally other reasons.  And the crazy part is, I was totally fine until the last fifteen minutes.  Then things started feeling wrong, like when you see a beautiful woman from behind, and they turn around, and it’s a transvestite with arm hair and a lopsided boob.

Warning: minor expository spoilers ahead.

You know, Will Smith did great in the movie.  I enjoyed his performance.  And I completely understood and could handle a lot of their choices.  Making him an Army virologist from the start instead of an alcoholic, suicidal plant worker for instance was a big time saver, because there’s a lot in the book that is about him just getting books and learning all the medical stuff himself.  No big deal, we didn’t have to listen to his complaining that way.  The way his wife and kid died changed some of the character’s motivational points, but again, it fit with the new story.  The dog being with him from the start, that’s fine.  Every bit of this is all well and good.  The “vampires” being more like ravenous animals with crazy CGI gaping mouths…well, that’s starting to push it.  In fact, I’m not sure why they felt the need to steep the vampires in CGI the way they did.

And then there’s the ending.  My god…the ending…Raise your hand if you read the book.  Okay, so you know how the title refers to him, and why.  The whole point behind the “I am legend” concept is that he really IS the last man on earth; that everything he is doing is what turns him into this huge bedtime monster, a legend that will be told for centuries afterward.  That’s the fricking crux of the whole story.  Let’s just say, that’s not how it goes down.  When you base a movie on a book, one thing you generally want to keep is the plot device that wraps it all up in a neat bow.  Otherwise all you really have is a movie that shares a title and a character name or two with the book.

The whole thing reminds me of Dreamcatcher.  But at least that film didn’t make me so mad.  But in the same way, you got to the ending and just feel like you need to punch someone, maybe a baby or a kitten, though the writers and producers would do, because apparently they read a version of the book that came from Bizarro Earth that didn’t end even remotely like the book.

The best part of this film was that there was a Dark Knight trailer at the beginning, and it was filling enough all on its own.

In the end, I can’t even tell you if it would be good if I hadn’t read the book.  I can’t see through the blind rage enough to try and take the bias away, and that’s saying something.