What's the best I Am Legend adaptation?

Movies
1

So which one do you like best? The original Last Man on Earth with Vincint Price? The groovy Omega Man with Charlton Heston? The straight-to-dvd I Am Omega with uh, Mark Dacascos? Or the most recent, I am Legend with Will Smith reciting Shrek lines to show how much he’s missed people?

I can’t comment on I Am Omega, I haven’t actually seen it, though I plan on renting it if I can find it. While I enjoyed the first two thirds of I Am Legend, the crappy CGI creatures and horrible ending turned me off. I haven’t seen Last Man on Earth or Omega Man in over five years, am I incorrectly remembering them being pretty great?

2

I wouldn’t call Last Man on Earth a great piece of filmmaking, but it does have it’s moments. Not having seen any of the other films yet I can’t vote, but I think it would be hard to top Price’s misanthopic take.

3

You forgot The Homega Man.

— Alan

4

The Last Man on Earth is friggin sweet. Haven’t seen the new one yet.

5

The book is my favorite representation.

6

Have the people voting for the Omega Man read the novella? it’s NOTHING like the book. It comes off more like a blackploitation flick with lots of guns, than a thoughtful study of vampirism.

Read the book. It’s better than all those screen adaptations.

7

I came into this thread to vote for shit bonerz. There hasn’t been a “best” adaptation of I Am Legend. They all suck dog wieners.

8

I admit I only picked “I am omega” because I haven’t seen ANY of these, so I figured it was as close to shit bonerz as they got.

9

I’ve only seen the Charlton Heston one. I didn’t even like it that much, but it still had the Charlton Heston late 60s/early 70s sci-fi cool factor going for it.

10

The Last Man on Earth is clearly the best adaptation - it’s not even close, as the other two only have superficial similarities to the storyline. That doesn’t necessary make it the best ‘movie’, but it’s clearly the best, most faithful, adaptation.

11

I once accidentally rented The Man Who Fell to Earth instead of The Last Man on Earth. You can imagine I was quite surprised with the direction it took when I realized I had the wrong film…

12

is the ending for the I Am Legend movie resemble the book ending at all? I’d bet it doesn’t. No spoilerz needed, just yes or no.

13

No.

45

-Tom

14

I think most people understand ‘best adaptation’ to mean the adaptation that you liked the best. Faithfulness to the original is a secondary consideration.

Of course, in this poll, all the adaptations fail, so “best” becomes kind of a meaningless term. “Least offensive” would probably be better. And really… I have to go with Omega Man on that one. I have a thing for hyper-religious jive-talking vampires.

15

Not sure if this has been mentioned elsewhere, but Xbox Live now has “Last Man on Earth”, “Omega Man”, and “I am Legend”, all in HD.

16

Last Man on Earth is pretty good, and despite its age is affecting in a few places (the dog).

Omega Man is horrible.

Also this thread is old.

17

What the hell do you guys have against The Omega Man?

I watched The Last Man on Earth and The Omega Man tonight and I liked The Omega Man much better. They were both good though.

18

Try watching “I Am Legend” with Ron Grainer’s “Omega Man” soundtrack playing in the background. During the moments when the onscreen action syncs up with the music, I guarantee a tenfold improvement.

19

Also not recommend is renting The Man Who Fell to Earth if you are expecting a faithful or quality adaptation of Tevis’ novel, you might as well go with The Last Man on Earth.

20

It’s your forum, Tom. You don’t have to type the extra characters if you don’t want to… (and I know a few people would thank you for changing that :)).