I've just completed my BA (Hons) Scriptwriting for Film & Television degree at Bournemouth Uni. I go...
I've just completed my BA (Hons) Scriptwriting for Film & Television degree at Bournemouth Uni. I got a 2:1.
Perhaps I could have got a 1st if I'd written fewer opinions on Ciao and paid more attention to my final script. Curse this site!!!
Member since:26.07.2000
Reviews:96
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It's hard to truly express how gutted I am that this supposed sci-fi classic isn't better than it is. Having read the amazing source novel by Richard Matheson, "I Am Legend", the night before, I was eager to see how it had been transferred to the screen. Not very well, is my conclusion.
As with the book, the "last man on Earth"(TM) on Earth is called Robert Neville...and that's pretty much it. Pretty much everything else has been bastardised for a Seventies' audience. Gone is the ordinary hero, struggling for survival against his own despair, mute due to lack of human contact, and searching grimly for an antidote for the plague that has wiped out most human life. What we get instead is Charlton Heston (obviously unaware that he has been typecast as a nihilistic antihero/action-man after his turn in Planet of the Apes), crashing his sports car by day and talking to himself. You never root for him, just feel indifferent.
Gone is the tiny little house with boards on the windows as Neville's only defense against the bloodthirsty vampires, replaced by an enormous penthouse, complete with elevator, electronic garage door and barbed wire, as well as every modern luxury a man could want. The location has been moved from (what I imagined to be) a quiet MidWestern town, to a major American city. Strangely, this detracts from the atmosphere rather than adding to it.
And, worst of all, there is no trace of the vampires which made the original story so compelling. Instead, we get a cult of chalk-faced religious zealots, whom the virus has turned psychotic, scuttling about in black cloaks and white contact lenses. Their feeble attempts to bring Neville down from his fortress are, frankly, laughable. Where's the tension, fer Chrissakes?!
Taken as a film in its own right, The Omega Man isn't too bad. In fact, that might be the best way to look at it since, technically, it only really "adapts" the last chapter of the novel, by taking that as its starting point. In then takes this premise to a conclusion, of sorts, whilst chucking in a few of the other themes (plague, antidote, the cult).
It's very much a product of its time: the clothes, the hairstyles, the political agenda: Heston spends his spare time watching and rewatching the film of Woodstock in an abandoned cinema, and the virus is stated to be a chemical weapon used in a fictional world war.
The plot only becomes apparent about halfway through, when Heston is Shanghai'd by a badass Cleopatra Jones type (another Seventies stereotype), and introduced to a small group of infected humans. Together they try to create an antidote before making their escape into the mountains. Luckily, Heston was a scientist before the war (another concession - Neville had to teach himself science in the book), and happily whips up another batch of the serum he originally injected himself with (which explains his immunity - clever, innit?!).
The stench of missed opportunity is rife. At one point, there was talk of a further remake, more faithful to the novel, starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. Whilst I couldn't agree with the casting choice, I would welcome any verson that adapts the book as is, particularly one that favours the interior monologue over pointless and irritating dialogue. Both audiences and filmmakers are more sophisticated these days, so what's the friggin' delay, eh?
I would urge you to take the unusual step of watching the film first before you read the book, rather than the other way around. The book is amazing - end of story, but The Omega Man fails to live up to such an awesome precedent. But, hey - dig that funky Seventies soundtrack, brother!
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Production Year: 1979 - Science Fiction - Director: Ridley Scott - Original Language: English - Classification: 18 years and over - Starring: Sigourney Weaver, John Hurt, Tom Skerritt, Harry Dean Stanton, Ian Holm, Yaphet Kotto, Veronica Cartwright
Production Year: 2007 - Science Fiction - Director: Francis Lawrence - Original Language: English - Classification: 15 years and over - Starring: Alice Braga, Charlie Tahan, Dash Mihok, Will Smith, Salli Richardson, Willow Smith
I saw this film many years ago without having read the book beforehand. At the time I thought it was quite good, though now I think it looks a little ridiculous in places.
Perhaps best watched in it's own right as it isn't the only film that fails to live up to the book.
Science fiction took a grim turn in the 1970s--the heyday of Agent Orange, nuclear peril ... more
and Watergate. Suddenly, most of our possible futures took on a "last man on Earth" flavour, withThe Omega Mantopping the doom-struck heap.Charlton Heston plays th...
Postage & Packaging: £1.21 Availability: Usually dispatched within 1-2 business days...
Science fiction took a grim turn in the 1970s--the heyday of Agent Orange, nuclear peril ... more
and Watergate. Suddenly, most of our possible futures took on a "last man on Earth" flavour, withThe Omega Mantopping the doom-struck heap.Charlton Heston plays th...
Postage & Packaging: Free! Availability: Usually dispatched within 24 hours...
Welcome to the future. Biological war has decimated life on Earth. Los Angeles is a ... more
windswept ghost town where Robert Neville tools his convertible through sunlit streets foraging for supplies. And makes damn sure he gets undercover before sundown, whe...
Advantages: Minimalistic, intellgent approach, chilling scenario, Charlton Heston at his peak Disadvantages: Not apparently as good as the literary source material (I Am Legend), looks quite dated.
EnglishPatient 26.02.2001 (23.02.2001)
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Review of The Omega Man (DVD)
Advantages: Minimalistic, intellgent approach, chilling scenario, Charlton Heston at his peak Disadvantages: Not apparently as good as the literary source material (I Am Legend), looks quite dated.
EnglishPatient 26.02.2001 (23.02.2001)
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Ciao members have rated this review on average: very helpful
Review of The Omega Man (DVD)
![The Omega Man [DVD] [1972]](http://picnicb.ciao.com/uk/78509353.jpg "The Omega Man [DVD] [1972]")
Apr 20th, 2001
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