This is a movie about fear. In an era of movies like Hostel and Saw that try to freak the viewer out with gore, Will Smith and Francis Lawrence have a created that isn't inherently scary, but rather a study on fear and the effects of it on the human mind. Why is this important, because as a culture we are obsessed with fear and in this upcoming election, FEAR is the crucial part of it.


But enough about politics, let's talk about "I am Legend" and how this movie captures the mood of our time. In the film, Will Smith chills out in the day time doing the things that people do: wake up, workout (maybe not everybody get's jacked in the morning), goes to work, drives around, watches TV, listens to music, and then goes to sleep. Normal day, sweet life. It's all in the preview



But then at night as you can see, all the monsters roam the streets. Essentially Will Smith gets jiggy with it in the day time, and then once the sun sets has to deal with all the problems in the world. How does he deal with it, by locking himself into his fortified and extremely cozy brownstone.

In one sequence of the film, Smith goes into a building to look for his dog. It is here, where Will Smith's flashlight cuts through the darkness that we finally sense that even though Will Smith has a groovy life in the day, he is petrified of the darkness, i.e. the true problems in the world.

And this is how the world operates today. We go about our lives, very consciousness of the world's problems like Global Warming



War


And Poverty
These are just some of the problems that are lurking in the dark of the world today. I am Legend is a great movie because it captures this mentality of the material life that we live (myself) and the problems that are lurking when we go to sleep. Hopefully someone will come and deal with all of them. That person would truly be a legend.