Dear Will, Francis, Akiva & Mark,
I'm writing to ask you if it's possible to get one hundred minutes of my life back. I'm more than happy to accept a cheque in some sort of futuristic time rationing in any of the following denominations of currency:
One hour and forty one minutes (or)
One hundred and one minutes (or)
Six thousand and sixty seconds (or)
Six point oh six times ten to the power of twelve nanoseconds
I'll be accepting cheques the moment some form of time-based payment exists.
Seriously guys, what the hell was "I Am Legend" supposed to be?
That wasn't a film. It was a poorly scripted but well performed remake of a movie that not only didn't need a remake, shouldn't have had a retelling that failed in nearly every way.
Oh sure, it starts off fine but it doesn't take long for whatever script you have to quickly degenerate into something particularly dull and lifeless.
Mark and Akiva… you've each done some good stuff before! Okay, well maybe not you Mark. You did what… Poseidon and The Cell? And each of those were soooooo great. No, seriously. I mean it.
Ok. I don't.
But Akiva! You have no excuse! You were one of the writers I wanted to be like the moment the credits for Lost In Space came on! I didn't want to be an actor; I wanted to be a writer and what with films like Batman Forever, A Beautiful Mind, and I Robot, we already know that you're a good writer.
I know! I've got it! Akiva wrote the first thirty minutes to an hour and Mark wrote the remaining crap!
No… no… that can't be it. What about that last action bit where all the dark seekers climb all up the house in a frantic attack? That was classic I Robot! And by classic I of course mean an absolute rip-off of I Robot! Geeze, when I saw that scene I knew what it was and I had no idea who had written this at that time!
Ok… so the good bits were Akiva and the crappy & pointless bits were the guy responsible for that J Lo piece of crap The Cell (sorry D'Onofrio). That's gotta be it right?!
Francis, Francis… where do I start with you?
Well, you directed Constantine and that was actually pretty good. And you also directed some J Lo videos and… well… it's J Lo. That more or less speaks for itself.
So am I wrong in feeling that Constant– I mean I Am Legend was Constantine but with "hell on Earth while we rip off The Omega Man and throw in some of Akiva's scenes for good measure" because really… that was the vibe I kinda thought you were going for with I Am Legend.
I'm actually not sure how you got a producer to fund this. Did it go down like this in some way:
"Hey! This script is great! Except for the ending which totally sucks! And except for the middle which sucks even more! And that final fight scene is straight out of another movie! And I love the main character's back story and how you've only filled in some of the blanks but totally left the rest of it as like one of those Mad Lib fill in the blanks magnetic refridgerator poetry things! That rocks! I think we're onto something with this!"
I know, I know. I'm a psychic.
Seriously, it's not the ESP; it's me planting recording devices all over Hollywood. I even know what you ate for breakfast. (Stop trying to eat the producers. They're all tough and nasty. You should put some Tabasco on it before you dig into one.)
And then there's Will. WILL. Big Willy. The man. Mister Fresh Prince.
What the fuck man?! What the fuck?!
Look at your career: you've done Bad Boys, Men In Black, Hitch, The Pursuit of Happyness, Ali, a movie about a golfer that no one remembers, Independence Day, and Six Degrees of Separation. At what point in reading this script did you say "well gee, this piece of shit might be good with me in it"?
I want to know. I feel like I need to understand Will Smith's mindset before he takes on a movie.
Was it the mannequins Will? Was it those lifeless models that show us what looks good? Because we could have given you mannequins in Men In Black. They'd be some weird alien that makes all of us infertile or something like that. At least we would've given you them in something people don't come away from going "I kinda wish I had gotten my vasectomy instead of watching that".
How could any of you knowingly put us — the audience — through such sheer unadulterated crap? Where as the adultery?! And where was there not product placement?! I now feel a need to buy a Mac and use XM Satellite Radio and GOD! I just can't wait for Batman vs. Superman… yeah, that one was so subtle wasn't it?!
Alas, I don't quite know how to end this letter so I'm going to end it with a prayer which is a very surprising thing for someone like me as I never ever ever ever ever ever ever pray.
Ok. Here goes…
I pray that neither of you make such a piece of shit ever again.
And if you do, I pray that I don't have to watch it.
Amen.
Your pal,
Leigh :)
P.S. Please give my credits to the dogs. Not only were they the best looking actors throughout the entire film, they also should win Academy Awards for their brilliant and convincing performances.