Last night, after stumbling out from the screen into the jarringly bright lights of the cinema, feeling dishevelled and thoroughly un-amused, I had an epihphany.

THERE IS NO GOD.

The “film” I had just been witness to serves as enough evidence as to why I have come to this conclusion. Because, O my brothers, last night I went to see Meet The Spartans.

Meet The Spartans
In cinemas now (but please, don’t bother)

You know that feeling you get, when you’re watching one of those horrific news stories about a man who raped and killed dozens of kids, or something? And you just hate that person with every ounce of your being, and vow to yourself that, if you ever cross paths with the individual, you will throttle them to death with your bare hands? Well, that about sums up my feelings towards the makers of this “film”.

Actually, that might be unfair. I’m pretty sure that writer/producer/director team Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer are actually either

a) Special needs kids, or
b) 11-year-olds whose father took them to Fox studios on “Take Your Kid To Work Day”, where they promptly wrote the script in crayons

Such is the quality of the finished product. Supposedly a spoof of 300, Meet The Spartans also finds time to poke fun at any number of pop-culture icons from 2007. And by poke fun, I mean put in the film hoping to raise a wry smile because you vaguely recognise them. You get Ugly Betty as the mysterious oracle – and, er, that’s it. Then there’s Paris Hilton, whose character is dumb and blonde. Then Britney Spears, whose character is dumb and blonde. And Rocky, for some reason. And any film that disses Rocky must have been created by morons, right?

I should probably also point out that all these “famous faces” have to have their names exclaimed out loud by other characters, since the actors/actresses portraying them don’t look a thing like them. Which isn’t good if your supposed to be an impersonator.

The principle cast, meanwhile, is just as unimpressive; leading man Sean Maguire, previously seen in, uh, Grange Hill and Eastenders over here in the UK (so christ knows why he was in this), has little…well, anything. Comic timing, wit, screen presence…he could easily have been replaced with a piece of blank paper stapled to a broom. Carmen Electra breaks away from her usual roles by playing the sexy slut. Kevin Sorbo, TV’s Hercules, struggles to hide the sadness evident in his face, the sure sign of a washed-up actor. Oh, and Ken Davitian, aka the “fat guy from Borat” (the narrators words, not mine) turns up. Playing the fat guy from Borat, except he’s speaking in English.

Much like with recent “comedians” like Russell Brand and Dane Cook, and comedies like Epic Movie, I just…don’t get what about this film is supposed to be funny. It basically plays like one of those end-of-year TV shows they have on New Year’s Eve, where they show clips from all the music, films and pop-culture events from the year. only without any witty commentary – they’re just replicated. In a completley shoddy, unfunny way.

Oh, and before I forget, there’s also some healthy doses of racism and sexism, just for good measure. Can’t have one of these dumb comedies (wait, scratch that – Anchorman’s a dumb comdedy, and I love it. This is a retarded comedy) without it.
I think I can safely say that while watching Meet The Spartans I laughed almost as much as I did when watching Schindler’s List. Which is to say, not at all.

Planet Terror
On DVD now

Hey kids! It’s time for part two of the Grindhouse review that I promised nearly a week ago! Woo!

Anyway, let’s get down to brass tacks. Planet Terror: this is more like it. Go-go dancer Rose McGowan fights zombies with her machine gun leg. Hells yeah.

If you’ll recall, in the Death Proof review I hilariously posted an image of me watching grey paint dry – a sly dig at how God-damn boring that film was. For Planet Terror, I have an equally representitive image, that sums up the quality of the film:

Yes, I am invoking the holy text of Die Hard 4.0, wherein John McClane, peace be upon him, killed a helicopter with a car because he ran out of bullets. That’s how awesome Planet Terror is. Didn’t you already read the bit about how Rose McGowan is a go-go dancer? Fighting zombies? With her machine gun leg? Huh?

I guess you want a full plot synopsis then. Well, in Planet Terror, rather than starting with boring girls talking, as Death Proof did, you get Rose McGowan dancing around in her skimpies. The film the continues to introduce bad-ass kung-fu truck driver Freddy Rodriguez, a testicle-slicing mad scientist played by Sayeed out of Lost, evil doctor Josh Brolin, Fergie out of the Black Eyed Peas as the good doctor’s wife’s secret kesbian lover and – oh yes – Bruce fucking Willis. John McClane himself is actually in this film. Conversley, at around this point in Death Proof…the boring girls were still sitting around talking.

Planet Terror really does deliver on the schlocky, OTT action promised by Rodriguez and Tarantino when these films were originally announced – there’s exploding heads, bags of balls (yes, those kind) and even a melting wang. Quentin Tarantino’s, actually.

Rodriguez’s reference points are obvious – the forboding mood and synthy score recalls John Carpenter (back when he was good), and the zombies are in thrall to Romero’s Living Dead series – Tom Savini, said series’ make-up maestro, appears here as a cop – and countless others. The film is also pretty straight-faced, in spite of it’s ridiculousness – Willis’ army general claims to have killed Osama bin Laden himself – which is a breath of fresh air in an age of tongue-in-cheek action films. And it just serves to make this film all the more like the awesome Grindhouse movies this is based on.

Oh, and a kid dies, which is always good. It makes up for the Haley Joel Osmonts and *shudder* Dakota Fannings of the movie world.

So, Death Proof – boring as shit, but has Kurt Russel.
Planet Terror - melting genitalia, machine gun legs, go-go dancing, zombies, lesbiabns, Bruce Willis

I think we have a clear winner, don’t you?

Since I was still slightly bitter about the debacle about the separate releases given to Robert Rodriguez and Quentin Tarantino’s Grindhouse over here in the UK, the other night I staged my own “Grindhouse Night” with some friends, where we watched both of the featured films, Tarantino’s Death Proof and Rodriguez’s Planet Terror, back to back: the way they were meant to be seen.

So, anyway, as an extension of this whole double-bill love-in, it’s time for the Second Hand Popcorn Grindhouse Double-Bill Review. First up – Death Proof!

Death Proof
On DVD now

Despite the fact it was Tarantino’s idea to do the whole schlocky, gory, exploitative Grindhouse movies in the first place, Death Proof…well, isn’t really schlocky, gory, or exploitative. In fact, it’s boring. Really, painfully boring.

For the first 40 minutes of this 114 minute portion of Grindhouse, absolutely bugger all happens. Really. Nothing at all. Just a group of women sitting around talking bollocks. Now, I know Tarantino is no stranger to excessive dialogue. The thing is, I enjoyed his witty banter in…well, pretty much all his other films (excluding Kill Bill). But that’s because the people who were talking were both likeable, and damn awesome. Hitmen, jewellery thieves, psychos, crooked cops, boxers…the characters of Death Proof are nowhere near as interesting. They’re just people. And they are incredibly boring, completely uninteresting people.

Now, if I wanted to some up the equivalent viewing experience of these first 40 minutes of Death Proof within a handy image and an over-used saying, it would be this;

At least in that scenario I could bet on which drip of paint would dry fastest, or something. There are no such luxuries with Death Proof. The film, up to this point, is (to paraphrase a Monty Python sketch) appallingly dull, unimaginative, tedious, has no sense of humour and is “irrepressibly drab and awful.

Luckily, though, Snake Plissken turns up to make things exciting for a bit.

Kurt Russel, who plays the character of Stuntman Mike (who is a stuntman. Named Mike.), turns up in the bar that the incredibly boring trio of women have been hanging around in, being boring. After some flirting, he manages to somehow get Rose McGowan (who wasn’t even in the boring group of friends) to get in his ‘death proof’ car – no matter how battered the car gets, he’s fine. It’s the people in the other seats that get messed up.

So, the film turns awesome for a little bit; well, about 2 minutes, since that’s about how long it takes Mike to roll his car over and kill Ms McGowan. Then, in the tradition of films such as The Devil Wears Prada, I fast-forwarded for a bit. And you know what? The whole time used to build up the boring, annoying ladies’ ‘characters’ was a complete waste of time, since they are completely inconsequential to the rest of the film. Because they all die. And get replaced by a whole other set of boring, annoying girls.

Then, 1 hour and 40 minutes into the film, it turns awesome again (after a pointless car chase that could have easily ended if the girls just pulled over), annnnnnnd that’s it. Out of 114 minutes of film, about 10 minutes is of any entertainment value. And about 4 minutes of that is a lap-dancing scene.

Quentin, for the love of God; just make another crime film. Stop messing about with all this cult movie malarkey. This is, well, like an intervention. It’s for your own good.

Anyway, tommorrow, get ready for: Planet Terror! (which is a hell of a lot better)

Resident Evil: Extinction
On DVD now

This film is really stupid. Really, really stupid. It’s stupefyingly stupid. Resident Evil: Extinction is the cinematic (and I use that term loosely) equivalent of a lobotomised goldfish. With boobs.

Somehow, when I first saw the trailers for it, I was somehow suckered into getting excited about it – zombies! In the desert! Milla Jovovovovovovovich chopping ‘em up! The schizophrenic gal out of Heroes! Awesome!

(Yes, I thought this despite the fact that the first two Resi films were shite)

Then I went to see the film. And it was bad.

The film opens with Milla driving around the desert (somehow the zombie virus has, uh, killed the world. It would have been far more entertaining if the world turned into one giant zombie. That Ms Jovovovovovovovich would then fight), when she runs into some hicks who decide, for some reason, to kidnap Milla and stick her in a cage with a badly-CGI’d zombie dog. Maybe they’d seen Ultraviolet.

Eventually, after somehow developing psychic powers (making her about as powerful as Jesus, if not more so) our intrepid heroine meets up with a CONVOY of retards, who drive trucks around and sometimes get attacked by zombie crow. And then decide to kill them with a flamethrower, which inevitably goes out of control, instead of, uh, hiding.

All seems well – they drive along, singing songs and spitting tobacco into buckets (or whatever truckers do) – but they don’t know that the sinister Umbrella company, who released the virus, and made Milla, are following them. I don’t know why. Apparently they want to take over the world – despite the fact that it consists mostly of zombies and sand. And traumatised teenagers who change their name to “K-Mart” because that’s where she was found by the convoy.

“K-Mart”? Really? If you had the chance to change your name, you wouldn’t change it to bloody K-Mart. You’d change it to “Dr Awesome MD” or “Professor Robocop”, or somethin. Not fucking K-Mart.

So, that’s all pretty on par with the absolute idiocy of the other two films.

Oh, but also, at one point the CONVOY come across a big old shipping container. And decide it’s a good idea to open it and look inside (I don’t even know where they’re driving to – or why). Guess what? There are zombies inside! Dropped by Umbrella! Christ knows why!

And someone gets snuck up on by a zombie. HOW THE HELL DOES A ZOMBIE SNEAK UP ON YOU? Basically, a zombie somehow manages to climb on top of the shipping container, tip-toes along, then jumps on some lady with her back to the container. What the hell, man?

And the only good character dies! That awesone black dude from the second film, who was driving around in a low-rider, running zombies over! I can’t even remeber how he dies. Maybe I just don’t want to admit he’s gone.

How can this film be so stupid? Really? It’s not hard to get the formula of zombies+girl in hot pants wrong, is it? Then again, when you get a film written by Paul WS Anderson (persumably for crayons), you can’t expect too much, eh? Expecting  ole’ WS to make a good film is like expecting a racoon to ski.

Eagle Vs Shark
On DVD now

Eagle vs Shark is the first film from New Zealand I’ve seen that wasn’t directed by Peter Jackson (this is the first film from Kiwi comedian Taika Waititi, aka Taika Cohen). Despite the fact it comes from the Kiwi country, it feels pretty…well, American.

The plot revolves around Lily (Loren Horsley, Waititi’s real-life partner), an somewhat unattractive (mainly due to the mole above her top lip) young fast-food worker, who, for some reason, falls for the nerdy, socially awkward Jarrod (Jermaine Clement, one-half of “fourth most popular guitar-based digi-bongo acapella-rap-funk-comedy folk duo” Flight of the Conchords), who is also somewhat unattractive (mainly due to the mole above his top lip; but the overbite and badly-cut mullet don’t help either).

After one night of sweaty, nerdy sex at Jarrod’s “Dress as your favourite animal” party (he goes as an eagle, Lily as a shark – hence the film’s title), Jarrod seems to get cold feet, and the newly redundant Lily (she was fired, at random, after her name was drawn out of a hat) joins him as he drives to his home town to kill his high school nemesis.

And that’s the plot of Eagle Vs Shark in a nutshell. Which means I should probably now explain that bit about how the film seems like an American production, which I’m sure you’ve been waiting for with baited breath (or you forgot, since I rambled on for so long).

Basically, Eagle vs Shark is like a Kiwi version of Napoleon Dynamite – except, in this case, pretty much all of the principal characters are socially-awkward, badly-dressed weirdos. There’s even Dyanmite’s weird sense of, well, oldness – it’s obviously not a period piece (Jarrod makes reference to going to see the as-yet unmade Wolverine movie starring Hugh Jackman – so I guess it’s set in the future?), yet Jarrod’s genius computer-hacker friend seems to be using a PC from the early ’90s, and the “Fight Man” videogame Lily plays at Jarrod’s party seems to be a 16-bit Mortal Kombat knock-off.

Unfortunatley, the aformentioned awkwardness is also kind of distracting – while in Napoleon Dynamite this was remedied by the humour, the laughs are somewhat spaced out, which means you get prolonged periods of these characters who you just want to smack around the head and tell them to start acting…well, normal.

While it’s very funny in parts, Eagle vs Shark may be too awkward and derivative for it’s own good.

Jumper
In cinemas now

Y’know, despite eveyrthing, I had high hopes for Jumper; it was a good story, Samuel L Motherfuckin’ Jackson was being all badass, Billy Elliot actually looked cool, and Rachel Bilson took her clothes off – but I didn’t reckon on two men (if you could call them that); Doug Liman and Hayden Christensen.

Now, I wasn’t expecting much from the former, seeing as all I’d seen him in was the Star Wars sequels, ‘portraying’ Mannequin Skywalker. And he waas awful. Just, truly dreadful. “However!” my mind interruprted, “Ewan McGregor, Liam Neeson and Christopher Lee were shit in those films too, but you’ve seen them act well in other places!”

This was true. So maybe Hayden could actually act, right? It was just the negative influence of beardy Lucas, right? Right? 

No. No it was not. Hayden Christensen could not act his way out of an episode of Eastenders. He is utterly, irredeamably shit. He’s thenew Keanu Reeves.

Anyway, I should probably actually talk about the film now, which is basically about a kid from a ‘broken home’ (if your Dad asking you to mop up all the water that you flung around your house counts as a ‘broken home’) called David Rice (Captain Wooden), who finds he has the power to teleport. Then one day, Roland Cox (SAM-U-ELLLLLLLLL), who calls himself a ‘Paladin’, shows up to kick Hayden’s ass – and you sort of want him too, because he’s a smug bastard – teleporting into bank vaults, stealing stuff, hanging out on Big Ben.

This is where that Doug Liman fellow comes in. For about 20 minutes after this scene,the film turns into some rubbishy romance drama, with David wisking childhood sweetheart Millie (Rachel Bilson) to Rome, then making her break into the Colosseum with him.

It picks up again with the introduction of Griffin (Jamie Bell), a way more awesome ‘Jumper’, who you wish the film was really about, as he beats on some Paladins with a baseball bat. Then nothing happens for a while, then a lot of stuff happens in a short space of time, thennnnn; well, it ends.

Jumper, really, seems like a long trailer for a what should really have been a series of films – I’m all for shorter films, after snore-fests like the second two Pirates of the Carribean films, but this film is almost too short; this leaves no space for explanations, character development (I swear, they’re so one-dimensional you shouldn’t be able to see them when they turn sideways), or…well, anything.

Maybe it’s just because I had such high hopes, or because I hate Hayden Christensen and think he should of been replaced by Jamie Bell, or because Rachel Bilson spent too much of the film with her clothes on; either way, Jumper was, well, a little bit shite.

Cloverfield
In cinemas now

Before I entered the cinema to see Cloverfield, the JJ Abrams-viral-marketed-monster flick, a friend instructed me, via SMS, to text him my opinions of the film afterwards.
After I peeled my sweating body from the cheap Odeon seating, and prised my white knuckles from the arms, I managed summed up my opinions in about five words:

“HOLY SHIT THAT WAS AWESOME!”

I think I can safely say, without reprieve (well, until I go see No Country For Old Men, maybe), that Cloverfield may very well be the film of the year. And it’s only Feburary.
Let me explain, using poorly thought-out sentences and analogies. The reason Cloverfield has me spitting superlatives like a ten year old who’s just seen Bill And Ted’s Excellent Adventure for the first time is because it manages to do what many (make that most) Hollywood films fail to do – it just works.

The film’s gimmick, if you didn’t already know, is that it’s all filmed on a handheld camera – not Michael Bay-style Parkinsons-disease shaky-cam, but actually filmed by one of the protagonists, the endearingly dorky and awkward Hud (it’s like heads-up-display, see?)

This “gimmick”, while making a few (pansy) patrons get motion sickness, really is the crux of the film; it’s what invests you in the story, the characters, the events – this film immerses you more than you thought a monster movie could, or, some might argue, should.

Even events that would seem, well, stupid in other films (a skyscraper leaning on another? And they climb up it? WTF?) instead make you sweat like a paedophile in a schoolyard, and I was actually scared in parts – and I never get scared by films. Ever. I watch horror films to laugh, for God’s sake.

Actually, the last film that really scared me is The Blair Witch Project, which was filmed in a similar way to Cloverfield; so I guess, if you want to make your film scary, have it all shot on handheld (though apparently that didn’t really work for George Romero’s latest, Diary of the Dead). But also make sure to create characters the audience actually care about, have some of that Joss Whedon-esque witty dialogue, and don’t just make it retarded as hell (I’m looking at you, 1998 Godzilla).

Those looking for a b-movie, guys-in-rubber-suits kaiju film of destruction…well, you’ve sort of got it. But it’s that bit extra that Cloverfield adds which makes it special.

In the meantime, I present to you: Nicholas Cage, dressed as a bear, punching a woman in the face.

Alien Vs Predator: Requiem
In cinemas now

Alien vs. Predator: Requiem (the “Requiem” makes it sound smart) didn’t surprise me in any way at all. It was exactly what I was expecting it to be – for the most part. Glossy looks, decent enough special effects, a crap ending, rubbish dialogue, and characters I couldn’t give a fig about (the fact that I was more bothered about what happened to the Predator character than any of the humans speaks volumes). And it wasn’t a patch on any of the other Alien/Predator films (well, except maybe Predator 2 and Alien Resurrection). Although it was, as I predicted before I saw it, better than the first one – which wasn’t particularly hard since the original, which saw an Aztec temple full of Aliens in the Arctic, was directed by Paul WS Anderson, mother of such cinematic abortions as Resident Evil.

Yet amidst all the stupid lines (someone makes the hilarious quip “It’s not Halloween for another six months” – to someone in his pizza delivery uniform. Is he infamous for his rubbish Halloween costumes, or is it just bad writing? Considering the staggering lack of back story, we may never know), the murkiness (yes, there’s a Predator fighting multiple Aliens – but it’s at night time, and it’s always raining, and the Aliens are black, so you can’t see a God-damned thing), and the ideas which sound like they’ve been come up by a twelve-year-old, who provided sketches in crayon (ladies and gentlemen, I give you… the Predalien!), there’s something other big budget horror films tend to lack nowadays – balls.

Big old hairy testicles. While some of the violence in AVPR (which, when you say it out loud, sounds like a noise a baby would make) is rather tame and rubbish, some of it is actually quite daring – a kid dies within the first twenty minutes (which made up for that annoying-as-hell kid in The War Of The Worlds, who really deserved to die), the Aliens invade a hospital and start killing pregnant women, and there’s allusions to babies being eaten. You don’t see that in The Grudge, do you? No, you just get cat-children.

For the most part, however, the film plays out like a Greatest Hits package of the Alien and Predator films – there’s the skinned guy hanging from a tree (see Predator), the Alien swimming (see Alien Resurrection – or better yet, don’t) – but only for the Alien/Predator characters. Unlike the beefcake Arnie and co/actually interesting Sigourney Weaver and Bill Paxton characters from the other films, the characters in are more broad caricatures – but that’s okay, because then they’re usually exploded/eviscerated. There sure are a lot of multiple choices separated by dashes in this review – and maybe that’s a good analogy to wrap up Alien vs. Predator: Requiem – a lot of multiple choices separated by dashes. Actually, no, that’s crap.

Alien vs. Predator: Requiem – it’s alright.

The Devil Wears Prada
For some reason, you can buy it on DVD

They say never to judge a book by it’s cover. However, this is a film, and the DVD cover offers some very good clues as to the quality of said film contained within this seemingly innocent case:

Clue #1 -  There is a positive quote from Heat magazine on it  (“EXCELLENT! 5 STARS!”). Heat. The magazine which consist mostly of pictures of Z-list celebrities and their cellulite. And not a lot else.

Clue #2 – I nearly fell asleep halfway through reading the plot synopsis on the back.

So, as I (attempt to) provide my own synopsis of this ‘film’, I’ll try to make it more exciting – mainly by using UNECESSARY BLOCK CAPITALS IN BOLD, so you don’t start to nod off.

Andrea ‘Andy’ Sacks (Anne Hathaway) is an aspiring journalist who lands a job at the fashion magazine Runway OH MY GOD MONKEYS ON FIRE RIDING MOTORCYCLES, where her ’hilarious’ lack of fashion knowledge is mocked by colleague Emily (Emily Blunt) ROBOT NINJAS FIGHTING ZOMBIE PIRATES IN SPACE and her boss, and head of Runway, the sarky Cruella de Ville-alike Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep) AND MR T IS WRESTLING GODZILLA IN A NO-HOLDS BARRED CAGE MATCH. Oh, and Stanley Tucci turns up playing the funny gay character out of Ugly Betty, only not gay, and not funny.

Then Andy starts to fit in more, turns vapid and mean like her colleagues, loses friends/love interest because of this, gets new boyfriend, he’s also mean and vapid, she sees the error of her ways, she quits the job, Miranda and Emily suddenly respect her, yadayadayada. The end.

In fact, the film follows such a cliché chick-flick plotline, I had to come up with ways to stave off the boredom – I thought of ways the film could be improved (mainly by inserting a sequence wherein a police car is driven into a helicopter, ala Die Hard 4.0); then I did that thing where you draw your finger to your nose and it makes you go cross-eyed; then I flew my biro around like a rocket (with appropriate sound effects); then I thought about how this subject matter is handled so much better by Ugly Betty; then I just gave up and fast-forwarded a large portion of the middle of the film.

(Also, Torchwood was on, and I didn’t want to miss it because I was watching this. Now there’s something that would have made this film better – bi-sexual, time-travelling aliens).

But since, as I said, the plot is so clichéd and all the action (if you could call it that) is so inconsequential, it didn’t really matter. I could follow the story, even at twenty times the speed.

The Devil Wears Prada is just so…lame. Not even offensively bad, just lame. The supposedly ’witty’ banter between one-dimensional characters I couldn’t give a monkey’s about, the dull love-triangle which lasts about five seconds (literally for me, since I was still fast-forwarding at that point). Also, Anne Hathaway is probably the least convincing ‘ugly duckling’ character ever. I can sort of handle the mocking of her supposedly ‘dorky’ dress sense, but calling her fat? She’s Anne Hathaway! I could see her collarbone at one point, she’s so skinny! Gah!

Maybe it’s just some satirizing of the whole size-zero, crazily impossible pressure they put on girls in the fashion industry – but I doubt it. This film isn’t that smart.

In the end, The Devil Wears Prada is just as empty, vapid and shallow as the fashion industry which it attempts to satirize.

(Note: Torchwood wasn’t actually that good. But still worth fast-forwarding this for)

(Second note: Christ knows why I watched this. The person who lent me it also lent me Freddie Got Fingered, for God’s sake) 

I Am Legend (2007) – In cinemas now

That’s probably a poor choice of headline, seeing as the film being reviewed here is nowhere near as interesting as said headline may make it seem. There’s certainly no rapping, hilarious quips or, arguably, any vampires. But we’ll get to that later.

I Am Legend is the sophomore effort from former music video director Francis Lawrence. Lawrence’s first film, Constantine, was a rubbish adaptation of the rather brilliant comic book Hellblazer, which saw a blonde, charasmatic, witty Liverpuldian being turned into black-haired, monotone American Keanu Reeves, paragon of plank-based technology. With I Am Legend, Lawrence turns this startling abiltiy to ruin perfectly good source material to Richard Matheson’s classic 1950s story of the last man on earth.

The last man in question, Dr Robert Neville, is played by the Fresh Prince himself, Will Smith. Under most circumstances, Will Smith could have been the least convincing movie scientist this side of the Arnold Schwarzenegger in the 1994 ‘comedy’ Junior. However, this is Will Smith in acting mode – as previously seen in 2003 biopic Ali and last year’s The Pursuit Of Happyness – so he is, relativley, convincing.

No quipping, no cheesy smiles – in fact, very little humour at all. None, in fact. At all.

This is probably because, in this film, there is very little for old Wills to make jokes about – he is, after all, the only human left alive, since a viral infection turned the rest of the world’s population into vampires. Neville (Smith) stalks the empty streets of New York by day, his trusty dog Sam by his side, hunting deer, talking to mannequins and looking for supplies. It’s actually a very well acted study of a man’s slow descent into madness – which, as Neville hasn’t had any human contact in three years, is understandable.

However, while these scenes are well acted, written, lit etc. etc., once the good doctor returns to his home base, has boarded up his doors and windows and retreated to hide in the bathtub with a rifle, does the film start to falter. It’s mainly due to the vampires attacking the walls of Neville’s house every night.

Well, I say vampires. That’s what they were in the book. In the film, they resemble little more than pale, skinny slapheads, who are averse to sunlight. Sort of like bald goths, then. Bald goths rendered in absolutley God-awful, sub-Playstation 2-cut-scene CGI. It’s soon after the first encounter with these night-walkers that the film starts it’s steady descent downhill, picking up speed at each ill-advised plot turn and rubbish special effect. Which is quite disappointing, really, for a film with so much potential.

Then, the film just ends. Will Smith wanders about a bit, sees some vampires, tries to come up with a cure, and then the film ends. Nothing else happens. Well, some stuff happens, but it’s fairly inconsiquential. The it ends. It’s the most anti-climactic ending since the I went to see Fantastic Four on holiday, and the print broke ten minutes in. It’s like getting halfway along a session of good old fashioned self-abuse, when, suddenly, your hand falls off. Or blows up.

And Will Smith didn’t even do a song about fighting vampires, or nodding your head, or whatever, over the credits.

If the story of I Am Legend intrigued you, however, I’d recommend either eading Richard Matheson’s original book, tracking down the BBC Radio 4 reading of the novel, or downloading the Vincent Price-starring 1960s adapt The Last Man On Earth, which you can get, legally, from the Internet Archive.

Just don’t, whatever you do, watch The Asylum’s 100% unrelated, not-at-all-a-cash-in film I Am Omega. Just because it stars Mark Dacascos doesn’t mean it’s going to be good. And that’s an important life lesson, I think.