Thoughts on: I Am Legend **SPOILERS**

I finally got to see I Am Legend last night. I was initially very impressed with WIll Smith's performance. I've been watching scary movies since the age of ten, but he still managed to have just the right amount of crazy glinting in his eyes to make me scared of what would be coming later. The movie made me jump several times, and the suspense was really well done throughout. I'd say the first half of the movie was great.

I was kind of ambivalent about the monsters (zombies? vampires? some weird hybrid?) The idea of them was scarier than the look. I know they made the choice to do CGI because someone thought that humans in makeup weren't quite cutting it, but I think that may have been a mistake. The CGI zampires went a step too far. The stretching maws brought me out of the reality that Smith's Dr. Neville brought me into. In my mind I was saying, "okay...scary...scary...pfft, stretchy-face, that's not real...not so scary." The moments of drama, where we see Dr. Neville's memories of the last moments with his family moved and disturbed me at once. I can't say enough what a fine actor Will Smith has grown into. Too bad he couldn't save the second half of the movie from bad writing.

**BIG SPOILERS**

The movie had me right up until the point where Dr. Neville got captured. I believed that he could free himself from the trap and then get injured when he fell out of it. But - and the headlights of the train coming through plot hole #1 are in sight - why the hell did he not get up and book it out of there? He started scooting backwards, slowly, on his butt because he presumable could not walk. First of all, if you're going to scoot, scoot fast if you know you have a matter of seconds before a band of creepies are coming after you. It made no sense that this guy, who has endure for three years could not push himself to get up or to move faster. And, quite frankly, if they'd stuck with that, I would have grudgingly accepted it. But then once he actually got attacked and his dog got bitten, suddenly, miraculously, he was cured, could stand, could hobble to his car, could shoot a gun and wrestly a zampire dog and could carry his injured dog. Well hell, Dr. Neville if you'd just done that ten seconds earlier, you could have kept the damned dog! I smell contrivance in the air.

So, Dr. Neville somehow managed to get home to find out his dog was infected and then has to kill said pup. Very heart-wrenching. No one ever wants to see the kid or the pet bite it. Of course this caused Dr. Neville to snap and go on a suicide run after the zamps. Listen! You can hear the whistle of Contrivance Train #2 in the distance. Seconds before he having his head ripped off, he was saved! By a woman and her son weilding a handgun and a flashlight.

...

Yeah, so he had to live in a virtual bunker to survive, but this woman and her kid could thwart an entire army of baddies by themselves.

The trains crashed, the movie derailed. I should have called it quits right then. It just got downright silly, and I won't even bother to spoil the climax, which was unimpressive at best. I will say this though, the zamps could apparently scale a building in a matter of seconds with no problem.

The movie ended with Superwoman and her sidekick, who, by the way was not given a single line, finding a survivors colony. They came upon a huge steel gate that was opened by armed military types. With a voiceover, the camera panned back and you could see this wall, very much like the Great Wall of China, around this big complex.

Umm...the zampires can climb the side of a three-story building; they can't get over a wall?

If you're someone who can be forgiving of plot problems and cheesiness, then you'll enjoy the movie. I, however, am a plot snob. Holes just ruin the overall package for me. It's like seeing a nice, shiny apple, picking it up and then just before sinking your teeth into it, you find a nasty, black worm hole. Yuck. I am so glad I didn't pay ten bucks for a wormy apple when it first came out.

High School Musical 2

We were big fans of HSM, partly because the music was fun and partly because it was something we could watch with the kids without fear of our heads exploding (or theirs, like with Cars). So when HSM2 was announced, it was a cause for excitement in our house. Gus was particularly excited because it would be the first time he was allowed to stay up late to watch a movie like a big kid. It provided a great bribery tool all week.

Unfortunately, but expectedly, it wasn't anywhere near as good as the first one. It wasn't terrible, but I don't see myself humming What Time is It? anytime soon. Unlike the first installment, HSM2 didn't hold the kids' attention and they chose to go to bed halfway through.

The movie starts off on the last day of the same school year as the first movie, but already there was one continuity break that just screamed at me. Now, whether or not it was unintentional, the principals suddenly look way more polished than they did in the original movie. They just didn't look like they'd just finished their junior year to me at all. I don't mean to say that they looked bad, although I'm not in love with Zac Efron's new hair, I just had a much harder time buying them as the age they're portraying. And this is from someone who's obsessively and religiously followed the Harry Potter franchise.

The plot was pretty uninspired, but while the first half seemed to lack any realy conflict, the movie bounced back in that area by the second half. Likewise, the music in the first half, especially the first song, seemed to be trying to recapture the best of the music from the first film, but didn't quite make it. A couple of the later numbers got a bit more creative. The song I Don't Dance had some interesting elements of swing and hip-hop; Zac Efron's solo Bet On It was very reminiscent of one of my favorite scenes in West Side Story; the duet Gotta Go My Own Way nearly moved me to tears with Vanessa Hudgens belting it out and Zac 's teary eyed harmonizing.

I will say this in praise of the movie - the actors have all grown in their craft and the performances were much improved. The supporting cast was given more to do this time around and were allowed to show a more of their talents as well.

It's a likable movie. I don't know if we'll be buying the DVD - the kids may be ambivalent about it. But if they do want it, it's still good clean entertainment appropriate for a wide age range. Not what I'd call a waste of time or money. I'd give it 3 of 5 stars.

Edit: I was just informed that Gus loved the music and is already singing the songs. He's asked for the soundtrack and the DVD, so my review is pretty much irrelevant. The kid liked it.