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If you've been following this blog since the start, you'd have notice review postings of movies I've watched along the way. I just love to read into movies, and soak myself in them. Such a powerful media. Yeah, for those who in the know, I had wanted to get into NUS's 'Communications and New Media' degree course before getting into NAFA. Oh well, it probably explains why I think watching movies alone is so cool. [although you may probably think it's such a loser and pathetic thing to do =( ][spoiler alert]
Anyway, caught the movie I Am Legend with some of the youths. Somehow, it feels like watching Castaway again (in a good way). For most of the 1st part of the movie, you're basically going to see the survival livelihood of the protagonist, Neville, going by his days in a forsaken city overrun by the Infected monsters. For those expecting a blood fest, you're gonna be disappointed, although there's still a fair share of action.
Yeah, heart pumping action that will leave you on the edge of your movie seat indeed. Other than the usual sudden sound scare, the movie really takes its own sweet time in building up the tension and anticipation to something happening. Especially at the first action scene where Neville goes after his dog in a pitch black building. With the background music off, and the limited view of Neville's torchlight, you'll heave together with the character's heavy breathing. You can tell he is scared stiff (and so was I), and something is happening in the darkness around.
People will probably complain of the movie being slow moving. I personally enjoyed those moments the movie took to show Neville's attempt to make things feel normal and his eccentricities, and the desperation as a lonely man, everyday.
It is really sad. And it is only then, that the true extent of his pain of losing a particularly close companion in his own hands, is understood.
My name is Robert Neville. I am a survivor living in New York City. I am broadcasting on all AM frequencies. I will be at the South Street Seaport everyday at mid-day, when the sun is highest in the sky. If you are out there... if anyone is out there... I can provide food, I can provide shelter, I can provide security. If there's anybody out there... anybody... please. You are not alone.
You'd really feel for him, as he calls out and pleas through a daily broadcast, with hopes of finding someone out there. When you see him crying out to a mannequin for any sort of response, you don't know whether to laugh or cry for him. It made me think about the times when I behaved like a 'mannequin' in relating to others, being superficial and building up walls to others, and how I felt talking to one.
But deep within, Neville's heart was already numb and dead, if not, bordering on insanity after 3 years of fending off the Infected, as well as his own loneliness. Such a tragedy can only leave a man devoid of any hope, scoffing at anyone who would dare to offer an reasoning of a high Being or power...
Anna: The world is quieter now. We just have to listen. If we listen, we can hear God's plan.
Neville: God's plan.
Anna: Yeah.
Neville: All right, let me tell you about your "God's plan". Six billion people on Earth when the infection hit. KV had a ninety-percent kill rate, that's five point four billion people dead. Crashed and bled out. Dead. Less than one-percent immunity. That left twelve million healthy people, like you, me, and Ethan. The other five hundred and eighty-eight million turned into your dark seekers, and then they got hungry and they killed and fed on everybody. Everybody! Every *single* person that you or I has ever known is dead! Dead! There is no god!
Yet at the end, in the midst of inpending doom, hope prevailed and won the battle within him, as he realises his purpose, and that his decision to stay at ground zero was not a futile one, with a last minute realisation that the cure he had been working on was actually working. It was all enough for him to sacrifice his life in order for the remaining 2 survivors to escape with the formula, responding to Anna's call to listen earlier...
Neville: I'm listening.
It's a rare zombie type of movie that I've enjoyed, other than the ending which was disappointing after all that buildup. Fans of noisy and flashy movies like Transformers take note, this is a movie about a man's struggle with silence. An unsettling silence around, and within him.