i am legend

2 things convinced me to take a gander at this film
the similarly (near) futuristic film titled children of men
which to me was moving, believable, worrying, and excellently done
it gave a none too pleasant view of how our world is developing
secondly a little article i read on new years day
with some predictions of what will happen of significance in 2008
apparantly someone will announce the development of a synthetic organism
yay - plug in some microprocessors and we can make like um robots
with the inherent function of self-repair
they could be used for all sorts of interesting things
like fighting wars - no goodies will die - just the baddies
anyway a bit of leap forward in my imagination there
but it did spark an interest in this near future film
as it is about one man left alive on the planet in 2012
following the outbreak of a man-made anti-cancer virus
that went horribly wrong and turned humans into mutant zombies
will smith takes the lead role in the film
which is actually based on a book of the same name
written in 1954 by richard matheson
and set then in a futuristic 1976 to 1979
the book has been credited with starting the zombie genre
this the latest in several attempts at making a film of the book
has copped a fair amount of criticism for it's deviation from the story
for example the author intended the title to indicate a story or a fable
will smith has successfully turned the title into a personal annointment
a kind of chest-beating, heroic, dude takes on all kind of character
the opening scenes set the tone for the rest of the film
all the action is set on the island of manhattan in new york
he's the ultimate boy racer in the ultimate boy-racer's car
speeding through empty streets doing crazy manouvers
armed with some kind of high-powered hunting rifle
loyal dog by his side (a german shepherd of course)
hunting down a pack of antelopes (where did they come from?)
during the day he hits golf balls off the wing of a jet fighter
gathers food from crops of corn (they have those in manhattan?)
or else raiding the pantries of homes for tinned food
he also visits the local video rental store
and has an endless supply of dvds at his disposal
playing in the background at times and featuring familiar films
the cynic in me says for the point of cross-promotion
our hero continues to work as it turns out he is a top viralogist
as he continuously states mostly in flashbacks to his family
this is my ground zero and i can fix this
those flashbacks show him bidding farewell to his family
with their last act together being a prayer
god is mentioned quite a few times through the film
particularly when a woman miraculously appears to save him
as he is under attack from the (yawn) scary monsters
at one point it occurred to me that wil smith
made for a very realistic lookalike of barack obama
and maybe unfairly i went looking for a connection
between him as the commander-in-chief with his weaponry
and the zombies (baddies) as the enemy of the u s of a
i.e. those muslims that similarly are out there in overwhelming numbers
nothing so blatant was in the film but possibly a sub-text going on
his attractive saviour claims god has sent her to save him
and in turn he uses all the weapons and his super-human skills
to protect her and her young child from the vampirish zombies
the film shoots, blasts and explodes its way to the big conclusion
whereby he heroically sacrifices himself to the zombies
so she and her child will survive and escape
to the human colony in upstate vermont
carrying the vial of blood with the cure
the final scene shows her at the colony
and it seems mankind will survive
so maybe there will be a sequel
i am legend too
groan