I Am Legend (2007)

Empty New York is creepy and cool. Lone human Will Smith is very good. The dog is awesome.

The story? Felt like a skeleton of a tale that never gets satisfyingly filled in. And the "infected"? Ugh -- why not just shave some actual sinewy people and give 'em dead-looking contacts or something? Would've been a hell of a lot more scary than the video-game looking baddies that were all-too-obviously incapable of hurting the hero since they don't exist in the same world as he does.

I also had pretty big problems with the camera work. Shots were often framed in such a way as to make it very difficult to get my bearings or even understand what I was seeing. In one of the climactic scenes, Smith steps into a doorway and we see a close-up of a dripping shard of glass. I had no idea if it was sticking all the way through a body or if it was still in the window frame. Pissed me off.

On the whole, the movie's more annoying than thrilling. I was constantly thinking of things that could have looked better, been edited better, or been written better.

C