There are more than 30 scripts, most of which are works that invite Lance as a director, but there are actually many works that invite Lance to star, which is the most concentrated embodiment of the Matthew effect in Hollywood. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 info

As long as Lance nods now, a cooperation will be reached soon, which is far easier than "I am a legend". Now that Lance wants to work with Warner Bros., he not only needs to readjust the script structure of "I Am Legend", but also needs to convince Warner Bros. to work with Chaos Pictures and further pave the way for the DC Universe, which will be an intricate confrontation.

Lance is confident that the "I Am Legend" collaboration can be reached, after all, this is not "Superman Returns", but the problem is never limited to this movie, but the knock-on effect caused by the film, which is the most difficult part. Of course, this is also the reason why Lance decided to shoot this film.

So, after relaxing, with a happy mood, Lance still retracted his attention and began to reimagine the entire script framework of "I Am Legend".

In the previous life, the media comprehensive evaluation of "I Am a Legend" was only 65 points, which is a passing score for commercial films, but it is still not a masterpiece. In horizontal comparison, the "day after tomorrow" directed by Lance is sixty-four points, it can be said that the two works are of the same grade, if Lance shoots according to the trajectory of the previous life, the quality of the finished product will not be too bad at least. However, the current Lance is no longer the person who directed "The Day After Tomorrow" two years ago, and more importantly, "I Am a Legend" and "The Day After Tomorrow" are two completely different works.

is also a work with the theme of the end times, "The Day After Tomorrow" focuses on the grandeur of the end times, more of a disaster movie, visual effects are the protagonists, and a weak story will not affect the box office of the movie, so 64 points are not only qualified, but can even be said to be excellent results; But "I Am a Legend" focuses on the biography of the characters, more of a literary film describing the end times, Robert Neville is the protagonist, basically the only protagonist of the movie, the weak story has a serious impact on the quality of the finished film, and sixty-five points is far from the real potential of the original novel.

In the original novel of "I Am Legend", "the desolation and loneliness after the destruction of the world" is the core thread throughout, Robert Neville is the absolute protagonist who deserves it, the novel examines the theme of the end of the world from a different perspective through the character of Robert, and Robert's delicate and real mood changes bring readers an immersive reading experience, and even begin to imagine what it would be like if they were the last survivors of the end of the world, which has also become the reason for the great success of the novel.

In the original novel, Robert initially thought that he was the last person left in the whole of New York, and that lonely and dazed, fearful and uneasy mood, with the advancement of time and the fruitless search, was amplified little by little, gradually pushed to the extreme, and even became depressed, so that he began to talk to plastic models and began to talk to his pet wolfdog.

This ambivalence of despair but having to survive has always tormented Robert, and the unreassailable loneliness is eating away at Robert's heart, so much so that Robert later discovers that he is not the only one who survives, and he shows a strong resistance to the fact that there are human beings in this world except him - this is the general state of depression, depression will be self-sorry and immersed in such a state, refusing to change the status quo, and even having an overreaction.

The original novel presents the process of this psychological change in detail, and it can be seen that Richard Mattson must have studied psychology, and what really makes the novel unique is this kind of reflection and thinking about human beings and the world.

The last "I Am Legend" also tried to replicate this trajectory, the whole movie has a total of 100 minutes, and director Francis Lawrence spends 60 minutes describing the theme of "loneliness", showing how Robert survives in the last days, how he suffers in loneliness, how he is looking for surviving kind, and how he tries to find a solution to the virus; In the second half, Robert encounters other surviving humans, and then fights the virus-infected zombies.

Because of Will Smith's absolute superstar status, coupled with the fact that the original novel gave Robert absolutely enough room to play, the movie put almost all the weight on Will and completely relied on him to support the whole work. It must be admitted that Will may not be an acting genius, but he still has some skills in performing specific roles and specific plots.

In particular, the dazed and depressed dazed and uneasy in the face of adversity, and the inspiring tenacity in the midst of despair, these are Will's forte. This is true of "Boxing King Ali" and "When Happiness Knocks", which won Oscar nominations for Best Actor for Will, and the same type of roles and performances, including "Seven Pounds" and "Shock Effect", which have received a lot of praise, are no exception.

It is worth mentioning that before Reims wore / crossed, after the release of "Concussion Effect", many people thought that Will's performance was very good enough to be nominated for another Oscar. But Lance believes that Will's performance does not have many breakthroughs, always repeating himself, and the force of the performance is obviously used in the wrong place, resulting in the whole character floating on the surface and without depth. If it was placed five years ago, ten years ago, then such a performance would be worthy of nomination and recognition, but if he kept repeating himself for such a long time without any breakthrough, then not only was it not worth it, but on the contrary, Will should also self-examine.

Returning to the work "I Am Legend", as a commercial film, Will's performance is undoubtedly sufficient, and he truly shows Robert's loneliness, loneliness, and hesitation and loss. But this has also become the biggest failure of the whole work, and even affects the overall structure.

In order to give Will space to perform, Francis used a lot of close-up close-ups, trying to show the loneliness and helplessness of the end times, so that the camera can serve the performance. But he ignored an important problem, the script itself did not leave enough space, and Will, even if he tried, it was still in vain.

In the process of adapting the screenplay, Aziva Gosman decided to simplify the long process of psychological transformation, focusing on Robert's loneliness and despair in the end times, as if he had intercepted a fragment of the original novel.

In order to show this loneliness, Aziwa chose Robert's family as the basis for bonding, but for the sake of the length of the film and the overall style, he only intercepted the night of the disaster, Robert's attempt to send his wife and daughter away from New York, which was about to be quarantined. Then the growth of loneliness lacks the source of power, resulting in a thin and weak character, Will performs very carefully, but the characters are still flat.

Cutting the footage didn't serve its intended purpose at all.

Not only that, the bond between Robert and the wolf dog runs through the first half of the movie, but it is not able to pile up enough details to impress the audience, not to mention the psychological transformation that advances layer by layer, and even the loneliness, vastness and loneliness of "the last survivor of the end of the world" are not convincing, just a superficial formalism, Robert almost did not directly and directly shout "I am lonely".

Aziva's adaptation is typical of commercial scripts, which is understandable, but it doesn't necessarily apply to "I Am Legend".

On the one hand, the first half of the plot seems a little thin, Francis is extremely generous to give Will a stage to perform, but Will does not have enough support points to perform; On the other hand, Aziva almost abandoned the delicate and intricate part of the psychological transformation, hoping to serve the commercial box office, but what runs through the film is the psychological description, which is the expression of literary drama films, and the two contradictory intentions make the work present a sense of embarrassment that is neither commercial nor literary.

It can be seen that this conflict originating from the creation of the script, the director's intention, and the original novel makes the whole story a little nondescript and disappointing after the whole story is weakened, which makes people deeply understand the difficulty of adapting the script. Of course, from another point of view, this is originally a commercial film, and Aziva's adaptation is understandable, but the problem is that "I Am a Legend" has not been able to achieve the goal of a commercial film.

For commercial films, weakening the psychological transformation of the protagonist, enhancing the protagonist's confrontation with opponents, and the rhythm is tight and high/tidal is the magic weapon of success. "I Am Legend" tried to follow this routine during the adaptation process, Aziva only used family bonds to maintain Robert's character image, and even did not hesitate to cut family memories to a cutscene, simplifying the story line as much as possible, and then focusing on highlighting the grandeur of the apocalyptic times and the horror of the atmosphere. The same is true of the original "day after tomorrow".

But the problem is that the first half of "I Am a Legend" is slow-paced, always focusing on Robert, the horror and desolate atmosphere is in place, but it has not been able to pave the way for psychological transformation, especially Robert knows that there are one percent of survivors in the world, but he suspects that New York is the only one left, the kind of loneliness and despair torture gave birth to the precursor of depression, so that when other survivors appeared later, they subconsciously refused, and this ambivalence did not give a reasonable starting point at all. It makes the story extremely thin, and even gives the audience a feeling of being puzzled and unable to understand the source of Robert's reaction.

The rhythm of the second half is slightly faster, but due to the lack of foreshadowing in the front, this also makes the follow-up plot a little inexplicable and fragmented, like a castle in the air, which can't really impress the audience, just the so-called "high/tide" to catch the ducks on the shelves, and the most important zombie battle ended hastily in just five minutes, and it feels like the movie has ended before it breaks out. This is definitely the Achilles wound of commercial films!

It can be said that "I Am Legend" is also far from tapping the greater potential of commercial films. (To be continued.) )