I Am Legend
Warner Bros. Pictures | Release Date: December 14, 2007 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
65
METASCORE
Generally favorable reviews based on 37 Critic Reviews
Positive:
26
Mixed:
9
Negative:
2
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Village VoiceScott Foundas
In what has been a pretty remarkable career up to now, it's this performance that fully affirms Smith as one of the great leading men of his generation. Read full review
88
New York Daily NewsJack Mathews
The Manhattan movie of the year, Francis Lawrence's I Am Legend, offers a stunning glimpse into how the city - as we know it today - might look in 2012 if it were abandoned in 2009. Read full review
80
New York Magazine (Vulture)David Edelstein
The first two thirds and change of I Am Legend is terrific mindless fun: crackerjack action with gnashing vampires barely glimpsed (and scarier for that) and how’d-they-do-that New York locations that retroactively justify the traffic jams. Read full review
75
Entertainment WeeklyOwen Gleiberman
In spirit, I Am Legend is caught in some abstractly doom-laden sci-fi past. For what it is, though, the film is well-done, a case of suspenseful competence trumping questionable relevance. Read full review
75
ReelViewsJames Berardinelli
As Tom Hanks did in "Cast Away," Will Smith pulls off this half-insane role perfectly. Read full review
75
Charlotte ObserverLawrence Toppman
The first two-thirds are classic science fiction, technologically plausible and emotionally resonant. It's only when God enters the picture that things slide downhill. Read full review
75
Chicago TribuneMichael Phillips
Smith carries it, even after the story loses its nerve. This film is the opposite of “Transformers”: It’s all about the unsettling silence, not the noise. Read full review
75
The A.V. ClubTasha Robinson
While I Am Legend is reasonably absorbing, it can be difficult to focus on the film that actually made it to the screen, instead of the many versions that didn't. Read full review
75
Seattle Post-IntelligencerWilliam Arnold
The movie year's most expensive and ambitious sci-fi spectacular, I Am Legend, is three movies in one: a futuristic effects-o-rama, a zombie thriller and a survivalist parable. Each is better than average, and the experience is fairly gripping. Read full review
75
New York PostKyle Smith
A scary, inventive, exciting and breathless adventure that combines the best elements of “Children of Men," “Escape from New York" and “The Road Warrior," but leaves out the worst stuff - such as the story-clogging despair and political allegory in “Children," a movie that made apocalypse look like kind of a downer. Read full review
75
Rolling StonePeter Travers
Trouble enters only when the script overcomplicates things in the end. Until then, especially in a growling dogfight, director Francis Lawrence (Constantine) keeps you squirming. Read full review
75
Chicago Sun-TimesRoger Ebert
If it is true that mankind has 100 years to live before we destroy our planet, it provides an enlightening vision of how Manhattan will look when it lives on without us. The movie works well while it's running, although it raises questions that later only mutate in our minds. Read full review
75
Boston GlobeWesley Morris
It's neither a neat little allegory about faith nor a transcendently entertaining one. I Am Legend is actually about the last man on earth played by one of the last real movie stars on earth. To be honest, Smith was all I was thinking about while I sat through I Am Legend. Read full review
75
Miami HeraldRene Rodriguez
For horror fans, Halloween came a little later than usual this year, but it was worth the wait. Read full review
70
The Hollywood ReporterKirk Honeycutt
Smith, sporting a newly buffed physique, delivers an extraordinary performance as a man slowly coming unglued under the strain of no human contact and a constantly alternating role of hunter and prey. Read full review
70
VarietyTodd McCarthy
Remarkably eerie yet annoyingly larded with cheap horror-film shock effects, I Am Legend stands as an effective but also irksome adaptation of Richard Matheson's classic 1954 sci-fi novel. Read full review
70
Washington PostDesson Thomson
Instead of maintaining its edgy sense of constant discomfort, the movie is compelled to make Neville as fuzzily adorable and messianic as possible. Read full review
70
The New York TimesA.O. Scott
There is something graceful and effortless about this performance (Mr. Smith's), which not only shows what it might feel like to be the last man on earth, but also demonstrates what it is to be a movie star. Read full review
70
Chicago ReaderJ.R. Jones
The popcorn elements are well handled, but what lingers is the sense of urban despair: watching old videotapes of the Today show, carrying on friendships with mannequins, Smith turns out to be no legend at all, just another New Yorker slowly dying of loneliness. Read full review
70
SalonStephanie Zacharek
I Am Legend is a blockbuster like no other, one that finds its grandness in modesty. It's a star vehicle with a star who knows his place in the universe. Read full review
70
Los Angeles TimesCarina Chocano
Slick, adrenaline-fueled fun. Read full review
67
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
Smith, it should be noted, has compared Neville in interviews to Job. Tone down the highfalutin references. In the end, this is a sci-fi zombie movie, folks. Read full review
63
TV Guide MagazineMaitland McDonagh
Matheson's bitterly ironic ending -- which pivots on the nature of Neville's legend -- is gutted and turned into formulaic pap. Read full review
63
USA TodayClaudia Puig
A little more than halfway in, Legend, based on the book by Richard Matheson (which also spawned 1971's Omega Man and 1964's TheLast Man on Earth), deteriorates into a schlocky zombie horror flick and loses its steam. Read full review
63
Philadelphia InquirerSteven Rea
I Am Legend is essentially "28 Days Later" . . ., or "28 Weeks Later" . . ., only with millions more for special effects, and with nothing approaching the heart-pounding, bloodcurdling power and smarts of the two British-made yarns. Read full review
63
The Globe and Mail (Toronto)Liam Lacey
After its promising opening, I Am Legend devolves into a generic zombie slaughterfest. Read full review
60
SlateDana Stevens
A big part of the reason for this movie's nose dive around the one-hour mark is that, seen up close, the Infected just aren't that scary. Read full review
60
Film ThreatMichael Ferraro
Instead of being the science fiction masterpiece Matheson fans have been salivating for since the 80s (when Schwarzenegger was once attached), it’s just another average Hollywood popcorn flick. Read full review
60
TimeRichard Corliss
The word "mixed" isn't mixed enough to fit my response to this film. Read full review
60
NewsweekDavid Ansen
I Am Legend can't seem to make up its mind just what kind of movie it wants to be. Read full review
60
EmpireDan Jolin
While the sun shines, it’s a four-star thriller with a superb turn from Smith. When the moon rises, it’s a two-star horror cartoon with some of the worst FX we’ve seen all year. So, really, it has to average out at… Read full review
58
Portland OregonianShawn Levy
I Am Legend has one undeniably cool thing about it, namely the vision of Manhattan as a semi-feral wasteland. Read full review
50
Wall Street JournalJoe Morgenstern
The star, as solo practitioner, does a terrific job of holding our attention when we're not taking in surreal vistas of a deserted Manhattan that are fascinating in their own right. Still, zombies are zombies, and this nasty lot, mostly digital creations of variable quality, keep draining the distinction that the movie seeks and occasionally finds. Read full review
50
Baltimore SunMichael Sragow
The credits list a couple of dozen medical and scientific consultants. What this film really needed was a script doctor. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleWalter Addiego
If you want lots of Will Smith and industrial-strength special effects, the movie delivers. Read full review
38
PremiereEric Alt
Overall, I Am Legend is a wasted opportunity -- a rickety, weather-beaten framework around an otherwise strong central performance from Smith. Read full review
30
Austin ChronicleJosh Rosenblatt
Unfortunately, after those first 10 minutes it’s all downhill for I Am Legend, as the film descends into a monster-movie malaise starring a horde of balding CGI monsters that look like refugees from a video game and that will scare absolutely no one, save those who worry that green-screening is ruining the movies. Read full review
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