I Am Legend is the latest - and best - version of the 1954 novel by Richard Matheson. The original story, set in Los Angeles, imagines a soul survivor of a bacterial plague, one causing widespread vampirism. This connection - between bacteriology and vampirism - is the basis for the modern vampire story, making it the mother of a genre that includes George A. Romero's Dawn of the Dead and Night of the Living Dead, as well as Blade and the Resident Evil franchise.

But every attempt to shoot this story - from Vincent Price's 1964 film, The Last Man on Earth, to Charlton Heston's 1971 film, The Omega Man, have taken liberties with it, liberties that never quite added up. I Am Legend takes a few liberties as well but clearly the third time is a charm. As a zombie film, it's a little late in the game but as a disaster film (or a day-after-the-disaster film), it's a modern classic. Zombie purists walked out spitting lava about the cartoonish look and feel of their monsters, but those of us who go to the movies to talk about life were hardly unimpressed.

Robert Neville (Will Smith) is the last man in New York (an update that works well in post-9/11 America). He lives a solitary existence in an apartment that looks more like a bunker than a walk-up. By day, he lives a charmed life, racing through the street, shooting venison that runs wild through the streets and shopping for creature comforts left on display by a disaster undefined. But he's a man who lives by his watch. However carefree our hero may be - by day - he watches the sun with dead earnest. At sunset, every door is locked, every window bolted shut. Our hero sleeps in the bathtub, armed for war.

It's in dreams and flashbacks that we learn what happened. Smith's real-life daughter, Willow, plays Marley, the daughter we no longer see. Salli Richardson plays Zoe, the wife who was so much a part of Neville's world - before disaster struck. Some of this film's best material lies between Neville's loneliness and the world of his pre-disaster memories. The contrast reminded me of Terry Gilliam's 12 Monkeys. If you thought Will Smith played it dark in iRobot, you ain't seen nothin' yet. As the portrait of a man coping with loss, this film takes the zombie genre to an all-new level.

But it's very much a zombie film, a fact that comes into play about 40 minutes in.

There's always a reason when someone decides to sleep in the tub, armed like Al Pacino in Scar Face. In this case, the night belongs to the degenerate forms of humanity, fearsome zombies whose bite is enough to infect the living. Matheson's original story had specified vampires, but zombies work better here, particularly the smart ones that have graduated beyond the grunting zombies of Romero Land. Zombie purists will be upset that this film's demons are special effects, but without the miracles of digital effects, you wouldn't see some of the cool - and frightening - imagery that leaps out at the audience.

Matheson's original story had also crafted Neville as a plant worker who adopts a scientific approach to what has happened. The 1964 adaptation, Last Man on Earth, changed Neville's name to Morgan (bad idea) but also imagined him as a scientist, an idea that caught on. This time out, Smith's character (Neville again) is a military virologist. This explains his equipment and skill set in trapping and treating the infected. Neville is working on a vaccine and so far, his efforts have met with continual disappointment.

The plot will thicken. When, where, why and how I'll leave up to you. One of the cool things about this script - from Mark Protosevich (The Cell, Poseidon) and Akiva Goldsman (A Beautiful Mind, I Robot, Cinderella Man, The Da Vinci Code) - is that it hearkens back to Robinson Crusoe. More than Cast Away, this film is about what happens when you find yourself all alone in the world - and what happens when you find you're not. I won't go any further than that, for reasons that will be more apparent to those who've seen the film, but suffice it to say, this film has greater ambitions than to simply be one more Resident Evil.

Recommended:
Yes

Viewing Format: DVD
Video Occasion: Fit for Friday Evening
Suitability For Children: Suitable for Children Age 13 and Older