I am Legend! I am Atheist! (spoilers)

[jack]

Omega Man

I didn't realise until after, that the story I Am Legend was adapted from, was the same as Omega Man was. What's interesting, is that they seem different. Contrary to what people on message boards say, it seems like they're based on it in different ways, and differ somewhat, as opposed to most remakes which seem to be copied from the most recent film, exaggerating the most iconic aspects. (I may be wrong, it could be adapted from Omega Man.)

Religion

I didn't consider it before, but I might as well. Everything was near the end of the film, it wasn't mentioned in the first two hours. The references I recall in the film were:

* The woman says God got her to hear his radio message
* And to go to Virginia (or somewhere)
* Will Smith says God can't have, he can't have let most of the world's population be killed and still be guiding people.

I don't know what it was intended to say, if anything, but it worked for me, against my cultural background.

* Will Smith's observation seemed pretty cogent. As you know, I already disbelief God's intervention, partly for similar reasons, *before* a global apocalypse.
* On the other hand, if you take the bible literally, there *was* the flood.
* It was a little surprising to have the woman be so certain, and be right
* But it was uplifting that she *was*. Even secular stories have their own sorts of miracles, and they are good to experience.

But it seems some people think the film was actually saying:

* Will Smith tragically lost his faith when he couldn't cope with what happened
* But he was wrong because the woman had faith and it turned out all right.

I guess it could be. I think it depends what background you expect to come from. If you live in a culture of expecting God's active minute-to-minute physical intervention, and some people doubt, it sounds like it is in support of that.

On the other hand, it seems likely the woman's experience was less revelatory than she thought -- eg. she was prompted to listen to *another* message on the radio about the sanctuary.

In which case, nothing impossible happened. But she found a path laid for her, which she faithfully followed to salvation. In which case, the film just seems a stark reflection of a question in real life -- in real life bad things happen, and some people are spared, but not all.

Of course, another view is that Smith hallucinated the ending. That could support pretty much any view.

Comments

[cartesiandaemon.livejournal.com]

I've been dying to read your review after I saw the title.

LOL. Sorry, I didn't consider that effect :) I'm flattered. FWIW the title, and end comments were a response to other people ranting anti/pro that it displayed Christianity who I'd seen. I wasn't offended, but I saw several people complaining online that it had an in-your-face religious message (or praising it for doing so, I can't remember.)

Personally I think it's symptomatic of the high-levels of religion in this part of the world.

Yeah, I know what you mean. I always forget/can't imagine what it's like living somewhere where that's the default, despite hearing anecdotes of people who literally don't understand the concept of atheist.

(And in the UK, it's pretty easy to slip from "don't care about religion" to "atheist", whereas if you're somewhere were even apathetic people believe by default, and being atheist is a big deal, you have to be more definite about it. I remember a few sci-fi books with incidental references to atheists, and in the author's note them feeling compelled to acknowledge that and apologise/defend/mention it. Where I recall a hearing of a radio interview with (iirc) Douglas Adams which asked if he found being atheist difficult, and the reply was "No, not really." :))

OTOH while one must assume that everyone portrayed in film/tv _is_ by default a Christian, this seems to rarely ever be shown. I'm thinking of TV I've seen, and the most recent instances of anyone not a priest or nun actually praying or referring to God in any way come from the Simpsons (where it's occasionally come up that by default everyone goes to church, and you have Marge, who's conscientious about it, and Homer, who believes by default but generally doesn't make any effort). So I can see why people might be surprised and vocal about a film where prayer works (pro or con), despite NN% Christianity.

Rather than seeing Smith as portraying a Neville who had lost his faith, I saw him more as a person who probably wasn't that much into religion but had gone to church a lot anyway

Yes, that sounds right. Or rather, I can't remember the film, but from what I wrote before, it looks like to start with he didn't care much, but when everything went to hell in a handbasket, he took it personally and became quite anti-god, and so at the end had to either stick to that, or admit God was right all along.

But that what I was musing on, near the end, was that to me it looked entirely ambiguous whether [(a) the film was pushing a message that God actually did reach into the world and make everything ok (and, by implication, that the world being overrun by virus wasn't evidence against His benevolence) or (b) that this was the sort of fortuitous "miracle" which often happens in films and real life, where following their religion turns out for the best, but not necessarily supernaturally so.]

And hence, I didn't feel it was anti-me as an atheist.

However, if you're from a culture where Christianity, either apathetically or seriously, is a default, then the film maybe does imply the first one -- and maybe does so in some inherent sense if that's what the film-makers were thinking, I don't know. In which case, you might very well feel aggrieved by the message of the film, I thought that might explain why some people felt very strongly about it, but I didn't.

I was curious to know if that fits with how you saw it...