The question on my mind at about 1:30pm last Wednesday afternoon was this: What is a guy who quit his job (over the phone (from another state (on New Year’s Eve(in a voicemail)))) expected to do on a winter Wednesday afternoon in Seattle?

Respectable answer: Get a fucking job, you moron!

My answer: Go see a movie by myself!

Tonight, after a week of absorbing it, I offer a somewhat, sort of, incredibly thought out review of the film I saw that day.

I Am Legend

The thing about the afternoon by myself movie is that I decided to make no specific cinematic plans going in. I had already seen There Will Be Blood the day before (yeah, unemployed me goes to a lot of movies), so there were no films currently playing nearby that I was dying to see. So the extent of my plan was to bus to the closest multi-plex theater and pick two movies. The top two choices were Charlie Wilson’s War and I Am Legend. I chose to sit through the latter first because it seemed like a good, long, fluffy movie to eat up an entire early after noon.

“Could I get one for I Am Legend please?”

“Uh. Yeah. You can.”

“Cool.”

“$6.50.”

The 20 year old with the cool ironic hair cut and the theater ticket seller tie thought I was so lame for seeing this movie. He was reading a book with Bob Dylan on the cover, so he must hate unemployed guys who come in and go to movies starring Will Smith as the last man on Earth. (By the way, I really hope more movies are made in the near future about Bob Dylan. Can’t get enough movies about Bob Dylan. Oooh, and Andy Warhol too! We need more Andy Warhol movies!)

The first item of note in my short journey from the ticket counter to the theater seat is that I am the only person in the theater. Makes sense considering the movie was released over a month prior and it’s 2:00 in the afternoon on a Wednesday. But I still thought it was interesting being the only person in the theater seeing a movie about the last man on Earth. Like going to see The Right Stuff in an astronaut suit.

As I cleverly included in both paragraphs above, Will Smith stars in this movie as the last man on Earth. A doctor’s brilliant cure for cancer ends up infecting roughly the entire human population with a virus causing them to behave like a mixture of The Lost Boys vampires , Dawn Of The Dead zombies (the remake where the zombies were all played by a young Bo Jackson), and the bald slivery things from The Descent. It’s the age old apocolyptic premise that never seems to tire. And yes, another cautionary tale of the deep dark side of technological and medical advancement.

Will Smith, playing the typical everyman hero as well as anyone ever has, is Lt. Col. Robert Neville M.D., a doctor working on the cure for the virus before it’s too late. He’s also immune to it for reasons they cannot figure out. So he lives while everyone else dies, making him the last man on Earth.

The story opens on a desolate uninhabited New York City. There are deserted automobiles everywhere and various plants have returned, making their way through the once impenetrable streets. Dr. Neville and his German shepherd Sam speed around in a Ford Mustang hunting something. They drive recklessly through cavernous block after cavernous block seeking out targets we’re not sure of yet.

Then we see them.

Deer.

Then we get an idea of what this movie’s downfall will be…too much CGI. The deer they chase are completely animated and for a minute I feel like I was transported directly from the theater to the bar, playing a game of Big Buck Hunter while downing my third trendy microbrew.

“Uh-oh” I think.

It only goes downhill from there. The remainder of the film revolves around Smith and his dog fighting off hungry, relentless, and dangerously computer animated vampirous creatures whilst attempting to find a cure for the virus in the process. I use the term dangerously computer animated because of the danger they present to the film itself–and the viewers. I Am Legend, with it’s slow pacing, brilliant sound design, and wonderfully performed/wonderfully developed main character has the potential to be one of the greatest sci-fi/action adventure movies ever. Seriously. I really mean this. Yet it’s one mistake of over animating it’s monsters destroys this in one swift swing. Think of a great athlete with every physical attribute to be the greatest of all time who throws it all away by doing drugs or committing some sort of felony. I Am Legend is the Maurice Clarett of movies.

It had it all and threw it all away.

The sad state of things in the modern action/adventure era is the belief that computer animation is so incredible. It is not. Sure, it enhances things at times. Terminator 2, The Matrix, The Lord Of The Rings trilogy and X-Men 1&2 are all examples of quality CGI filled films. But those movies knew exactly how to use it. They hit you with it at the right time (the liquid metal scenes in Terminator 2) or blended it in extremely well (almost every scene in The Lord Of The Rings (except when that dorky elf surfs down that elephant thing)). The moments in I Am Legend where I was expected to be blindsided with fear ended up provoking laughter. The infected looked so bad that I couldn’t remember if I was watching a movie or playing Halo 3 (you will notice this joke is very similar to my Big Buck Hunter joke).

This movie joins the sad ranks of films like Star Wars: Episodes 1-3 and about a million others that relied far too heavily on horrifically phony, immensely cartoony, dignity obliterating, over-rated animation effects. It is unclear whether the reason for this is because studio execs believe the masses demand it or because most modern day action/sci-fi filmmakers are that idiotic. Or is it because CGI effects are less time consuming and much cheaper? My money is on the last guess. But I’m not certain. I am certain I’d rather spend my money on a zombie movie utilizing real people clad in real costumes, animated just enough to not look like a video game.

But instead I spent my money on the opposite of that. My afternoon had it all, but I threw it away. Sad…just sad.