Will to star in I am legend

[viber_91]

Dont know if this has been posted before...

http://www.toxicshock.tv/news/2007/12/04/i...now-be-changed/

Director Francis Lawrence told Sci Fi Wire last week in a press conference, “I don’t want to actually discuss the ending, just because I don’t want, I want people to make up their own minds, but maybe there’ll be an alternate version at some point.”

I really hope that the first ending they had is better than the new and that it will be on the DVD as a alternate ending...

[Trey]

Here's a I Am Legend fansite I found

http://www.i-am-immune.com/indexnew.php

[Ale]

Will Smith is in charge in 'I Am Legend'

By J.R. GRIFFIN

Saturday, December 8th 2007, 4:00 AM

Smith's films have racked up $4 billion at the box office.

Will Smith has saved the planet from an alien invasion (a couple of times now), untangled government conspiracies and even entered the ring as Muhammad Ali battling George Foreman. But now the superstar Oscar nominee takes on his most formidable foe yet.

No, it's not the infected, flesh-devouring creepoids looking to tear him to shreds as the last man on Earth in "I Am Legend," opening Friday. It's the usual Hollywood blockbuster conventions that Smith wants to pummel.

It started with a conversation he had with screenwriter Akiva Goldsman, whom he met at the 2002 Oscars, where Goldsman won for his script for "A Beautiful Mind" and Smith was up for Best Actor for his role in "Ali."

"We posed the question: Why do the big movies come out in summer and the good movies come out in fall?" says Smith, 39, in smart gray slacks and a casual white V-neck that doesn't hide his somewhat unexpectedly buff physique. "Why can't you marry the two, even if it breaks the steadfast, tried-and-true pylons of Hollywood?"

On Dec. 31, Smith & Jada Pinckett Smith (with son Jaden) will be married 10 years.

The two are ramming those pylons with "Legend," an adaptation of Richard Matheson's 1954 novel. As a scientist immune to a human-killing virus that's left cities in ruins and some animals unharmed, Smith holds a majority of the movie solo, playing off only a canine co-star as he riffs with mannequins and carries on an inner dialogue filled with humor, desperation and the terror of a guy losing his grip. One also only needs to check the source material (or the previous big-screen versions of it, 1964's "The Last Man on Earth" or 1971's "The Omega Man") to know "Legend" won't go down as the feel-good movie of the season.

Onscreen heat between Smith and Eva Mendes helped 2005's 'Hitch' earn $175 million at the box office.

"It's terrifying, because when I look at 'I Am Legend,' I know there are things about the movie that I could change to guarantee a certain [box-office] number," says Smith. "I have a pretty solid grip on how to make a big movie. But because I do, the last thing I want to do is follow it.

"Now, I want to know: Can I create something? Can I break genre in a way that actually creates genre? That's a scary leap to make."

If anyone can take that leap, it's Smith. While still the "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" on TV in 1990, Smith sat down with his now longtime producing partner, James Lassiter, and literally studied the top 10 top-grossing movies of all time as the first step in becoming the biggest movie star in the world.

He's arguably accomplished it, racking up some $4 billion at the worldwide box office as he balanced big-ticket event flicks like "Independence Day" and "Men in Black" with comedies like "Hitch," dramas like "Ali" and last year's heartfelt "The Pursuit of Happyness," which earned him his second Oscar nomination, co-starring with his son, Jaden.

His hybrid hero/everyman charm has allowed Smith to write his own good-natured, nice-guy blueprint for Hollywood success. "The plan was to jump as far away as possible from what people know you to do, and then they will believe everything in between," says Smith.

It's worked so well for him, Smith recently offered some road-less-traveled advice to his "Hitch" co-star, funnyman Kevin James. "I told Kevin, 'Play a serial killer. ... Show how far you can go out of what you've already mastered."

While jumping genres, Smith has cultivated the kind of connection with moviegoers that makes his being the world's last human in "Legend" not a bad deal at all. In real life, his laid-back and famously stable family life with his wife, actress Jada Pinkett Smith - this New Year's Eve, they'll be married 10 years - and their three children perfectly complements his driven professionalism. (Smith also has a 15-year-old son from a previous marriage.)

And he isn't slowing down. In fact, he says he feels as if he's just getting started: He has next year's Fourth of July - the movie date he owns - locked down with "Hancock," in which he'll play a down-and-out superhero in need of PR. Then he'll clash with Nicolas Cage in the comedy "Time Share" and will reunite with his "Ali" director Michael Mann on "Empire."

But movies like "Happyness," "I Am Legend" and the upcoming "Seven Pounds," in which he plays a suicidal man who falls in love, hold a special place in his heart. "Those films show where I am in my life right now as an artist, what I'm thinking about," he says. "For example, examining how humans deal with trauma is a big part of those movies. That is something new to me, infusing where I am into the DNA of the material.

"I feel like Michael Jordan in the '80s. I am artistically in my prime. I feel like the next five to 10 years will be the best work that I've ever done."

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertainment/m...end.html?page=0

Edited June 1, 2014 by Ale

[Ale]

Will Smith on 'I Am Legend'
Will has a way all his own at the box office

By KEVIN WILLIAMSON -- Sun Media

BEVERLY HILLS -- Filming his post-apocalyptic thriller I Am Legend, Will Smith got used to being saluted by New Yorkers.

"Percentage-wise, it's the most amount of middle fingers I've ever received in my career," Smith says.

And this is the guy who made Wild, Wild West.

Why the hostility? Because to create a near-future Manhattan that has been left desolate and derelict by a lethal man-made virus, the production shut down streets and tangled traffic for more than 40 days.

"We shut down six blocks of Fifth Avenue on a Monday morning -- that was probably poor planning," Smith says during a recent media conference to promote the movie, which opens Friday.

"It's chilling to walk down the middle of Fifth Avenue ... At two o'clock in the morning on a Sunday, you can't walk down the middle of Fifth Avenue."

For the 39-year-old superstar extraordinaire, the less-than-jiggy public reception admittedly took some getting used to.

"I'm used to people liking me."

And, of course, they do and still will, at least if their morning commute isn't disrupted. In an era when stars are more vilified than respected, more victimized than beloved, Smith is a cheerful, impervious anomaly. As a box-office commodity, he is arguably peerless -- surpassing the likes of Cruise, Pitt and Hanks and able to attract audiences to even such middling entertainments as I, Robot and Hitch. Nor is his clout tethered strictly to extravaganzas in which he saves the world or gets the girl. Last year's The Pursuit of Happyness, a drama about a homeless father, may have predictably won Smith accolades, but it also earned $163 million in North America alone. Altogether, his movies have amassed more than $4 billion -- awfully impressive for someone who began his career as a rapper and sitcom star. Even now, Smith can pinpoint the day he graduated from fresh prince to Hollywood imperator. "July 6, 1996 -- the Monday after Independence Day opened," he says. "That morning when the box office came out (it was) 'Good morning, Mr. Smith.' It was so bizarre I specifically remember that."

And in the decade since, Smith has prevailed against the currents of celebrity self-destruction. He may be a superstar, but he has never been a spectacle. Nor has he let his private life degenerate into a gossip sideshow. Moreover, professionally, he has never acquired a reputation for being difficult or demanding. "It's sort of a cliche," Legend director Francis Lawrence says, "but Will's a pretty great guy to work with. He's really professional. He's as positive as can be. He's really smart. He's good with story. He's a great actor. He's creative, inventive -- you can't ask for a better person to work with."

And it's doubtful without Smith's clout, I Am Legend would've been made at all. The property, based on the Richard Matheson 1954 novel that had already been adapted into the 1971 thriller Omega Man with Charlton Heston, had languished for years in development.

A decade earlier, Arnold Schwarzenegger was going to star in it for Alien director Ridley Scott before a ballooning budget scuttled it.

A succession of filmmakers and actors followed until Smith came aboard with his Bad Boys director Michael Bay.

Eventually Bay bailed to direct The Island and Transformers, but Smith continued to circle, fascinated by the story's protagonist Robert Neville, the last non-zombie on earth.

Finally, two years ago, Lawrence, hot off the Keanu Reeves occult thriller Constantine, signed to direct.

Given that Smith has his pick of projects, why did he feel such an affinity for such a grim tale? "With movies, I am really connecting to the (author) Joseph Campbell's idea of the collective unconscious ... That separation from people, that being ripped away from people, coupled with the unknown of the dark and how we would fare in that realm, it's a primal idea.

"I loved this concept because it connects to ideas a 4-year-old can understand."

With Smith and Lawrence signed, production commenced last year in New York. And while the post-apocalyptic drama has become a genre unto itself with its own rules, expectations and landscapes, Lawrence believes the world they created resembles what would happen following a real-life catastrophe.

"We asked scientists and ecologists what would happen to a city once the population disappeared. And the truth is, nature would start to reclaim it ... It would probably become a more beautiful place."

With I Am Legend out Friday, Smith will next be seen as an alcoholic superhero in Hancock, out next summer. In March, before the probable Screen Actor's Guild strike hits in June, he'll shoot the drama Seven Pounds. Off-screen, he is plotting a return to his hip-hop roots -- hitting the road next summer with his former cohort, DJ Jazzy Jeff.

"Jeff and I perform a couple times a year, but we're going to go big in July."

For most of Hollywood, however, he'll likely remain Mr. Smith.

http://jam.canoe.ca/Movies/Artists/S/Smith...714939-sun.html

Edited June 1, 2014 by Ale

[Ale]

Smith plays lone survivor in New York City in sci-fi thriller

What actor could resist playing the last man in New York City?

Will Smith was first intrigued with “I Am Legend” more than 12 years ago when it was to be a Michael Bay feature - now he stars as Robert Neville, the lone survivor of a global viral catastrophe, in this latest adaptation of Richard Matheson’s enduring cautionary tale.

Smith focused on aspects beyond the premise of a man being hunted by mutants and going mad from loneliness.

“I am really connecting to the Joseph Campbell idea of the collective unconscious. There are things that we all dream, things beyond language. There are things that each one of us has thought, that connect to life, death and sex. To me, this is one of those concepts,” the 39-year-old actor said.

Calling it a “primal idea” that “a 4-year-old can understand,” Smith was asked how significant it is that the last man alive is African-American.

“First and last, baby,” Smith said laughing, referring to mankind’s African origins. “It’s funny, it’s almost a metaphysical idea for me. I rarely think about that - until someone brings it up. For me, at least, the acknowledgement of those kinds of ideas puts a weird boundary on my thoughts. I can’t allow myself to be a part of it because it sort of makes me think smaller.”

In last year’s “The Pursuit of Happyness [trailer],” Smith co-starred with son Jaden. Now he shares the screen with daughter Willow, 7.

“You kind of don’t work with Willow, you work for Willow,” he joked. “She just wants it; she has a drive, an energy.”

Smith recalled shooting in New York on a wintry below-zero night. “Willow is out there and she’s cold, getting a little irritable. She looks at me and says, ‘Daddy, I don’t care how low it goes, I’m going to finish.’ I was like, ‘That’s good, baby, because Daddy is leaving if it go any lower.’ ”

http://news.bostonherald.com/entertainment...ticleid=1049609

Edited December 9, 2007 by Ale

[Ale]

Will Smith and company destroy humanity and shut down New York City for I Am Legend

http://www.scifi.com/sfw/interviews/sfw17559.html

[Ale]

What's riskier for Smith: vampires or a one-man show?

By Chris Lee

Los Angeles Times

Will Smith stars in "I Am Legend," opening Dec. 14. Illustrates FILM-LEGEND-SMITH (category e) by Chris Lee © 2007, Los Angeles Times. Moved Thursday, Nov. 8, 2007. (MUST CREDIT: Los Angeles Times photo by Genaro Molina.)

HOLLYWOOD — Last year, they shut down New York for a few hours so Will Smith could be alone.

It came neither easy nor cheap, snarling traffic and making more than a few people very angry in the process. But one busy Monday morning in October 2006, a production crew for the sci-fi drama "I Am Legend" cordoned off several blocks of Manhattan's Fifth Avenue and completely depopulated the area so the Oscar-nominated star of "Ali" could be filmed walking cautiously down one of the city's most traveled arteries in total solitude — his surroundings utterly and perfectly still.

"That was aggressive. I don't think anyone's going to be able to do that in New York again any time soon," Smith said, breaking into a wide grin at the memory. "People were not happy. That's the most middle fingers I've ever gotten in my career."

Nobody said it was going to be easy portraying the last man on Earth — a military scientist who survives a biological pandemic that apparently has turned the rest of humanity into night-crawling vampire zombies. Over the previous 12 years, a panoply of A-list actors had been attached to the role — notably Tom Cruise, Michael Douglas and Arnold Schwarzenegger — but until Smith came along, none could shepherd the high-concept project into production.

Sticking Point A: The "Legend" protagonist is an island unto himself, spending his daylight hours trying to concoct an antidote to vampirism and retiring to his locked and loaded Greenwich Village brownstone at night when the freaks come out for blood. That means, for much of the movie — even when backdropped by quintessential Big Apple locations including Washington Square Park and Times Square — he's the last man on-screen.

Smith has bumped up against the apocalypse in movies before, battling legions of murderous androids in "I, Robot" and intercepting marauding aliens set on conquering Earth in "Independence Day." "Legend," however, represents a risk for one of the biggest movie stars in the world. Reportedly budgeted at more than $100 million, it's a big-budget one-man show in which he's seen emoting opposite a dog, various mannequins and computer-generated monsters. Think "Castaway" meets "28 Days Later."

"It is an extremely delicate balancing act — not going too far one way or another," Smith said, dripping with movie blood now on the set of his postmodern superhero flick "Hancock." "The second you have one too many explosions, one music cue a little too high, you destroy it. You lose it all."

Since combining forces with screenwriter-producer Akiva Goldsman and director Francis Lawrence on the project in 2005, the stated ambition with "Legend" has been to cross-pollinate summer blockbuster-style eye candy with the gravitas of an awards-season Serious Film.

But "I Am Legend," which opens Friday, arrives as the third big-screen iteration of celebrated "Twilight Zone" writer Richard Matheson's popular 1954 science-fiction novella of the same name. "The Last Man on Earth," a low-budget version shot in Italy and starring Vincent Price, was released in 1964. In 1971, the material was reworked again in the service of "The Omega Man," which pitted Charlton Heston against a clan of psychotic albino mutants. Matheson's book also has been cited as a primary influence on precisely the sort of genre movie "Legend" wants nothing to do with: George Romero's 1968 zombie masterwork, "Night of the Living Dead."

Since 1997, a who's who of big-deal action and genre directors has flirted with remaking "Legend," among them: Ridley Scott, Guillermo Del Toro and Michael Bay, who was set to begin filming "Legend" with Smith in 2002 when the project was pre-empted by British director Danny Boyle's cerebral horror fantasy "28 Days Later." That film depicts a similarly disease-ravaged, post-apocalyptic wasteland — replete with depopulated London locales — in which a trio of heroes who likewise may be the last people on Earth battle flesh-eating zombies for survival.

The project's colorful development history left Lawrence — director of "Constantine," the hit 2005 comic-book adaptation starring Keanu Reeves as a supernatural detective who battles Satan — feeling somewhat apprehensive about mounting his own adaptation of "Legend."

"There's been some big talent attached," said Lawrence, on break from final editing of the film. "So people in the business are waiting to see it, wondering how (the other directors) would have stacked up. In terms of mass audience, I'm not daunted at all. But people in the business are daunting to me."

For Smith, who says he has felt compelled to have his movies "mean something" since topping the box-office chart with his inspirational father-son drama "The Pursuit of Happyness" last year, the movie was a splashy way to pose certain big existential questions.

"The sneaky secret is that this one is Job," Smith said of his character in "Legend." "You take a man, take everything from him, and can he find a reason to continue? Can he find the hope or desire to excel and advance in life? Or does the death of everything around him create imminent death for himself?"

The actor paused for a moment, then added, "The question is, can you do that with a wonderful character piece wrapped in blockbuster clothes?"

http://seattletimes.nwsource.com/html/movi...illsmith10.html

Edited June 1, 2014 by Ale

[Ale]

Survival of the fittest

Trainer explains how Will Smith became the stuff of Legend

Welcome to Earth. Population: Will Smith

His character, Robert Neville, is the last man on Earth in I Am Legend, and the future of mankind depends on his ability to outlast relentless mutant zombies. Fitness is key to Neville's survival and, Will Smith believes, it's key to excelling in our lives.

The workout scene that has audiences gasping is Smith performing impressive behind-the-head pull-ups. "He does four sets of 50 reps with less than two-minute rests between sets and he imagines he's got the weight of the world on his shoulders," explains Darrell Foster, an 18-year boxing and fitness coach for former champ Sugar Ray Leonard, a martial arts expert and Smith's long-time trainer (omegabodies.com).

The hypertonic look Smith achieved, wasn't for eye-candy, but a result of the high level of conditioning the character needed to defeat the "infected."

"Will's character has to workout to be prepared because he's under attack", Foster explains. "Neville never knows how far he'll have to run or for how long and his life depends on it. Part of the character's motivation is: 'I have to survive'.

"He works out and runs during the day to stay healthy and quick because at night he combats monsters."

Smith was in his maintenance phase prior to principal photography, so Foster put Smith through his version of a survivalist camp: Running eight kilometres daily combined with a hypertrophy strength-training program on a high-protein/low-carb diet.

A high-protein diet is a muscle-maker, but low carbing is an elocution breaker.

"In filming you run into a problem when cutting carbs: Monologues," Foster says, noting the lack of carbohydrates means low energy and focus.

TRICK THE CAMERA

"That's why it's for a short time period, for three weeks only -- it's not a lifestyle. It's not healthy to put on 20 pounds, drop 20 pounds and then put back 30 pounds (as Smith has done for his next film, Hancock, which accounts for why he looks more filled out on the cover of the December issue of Men's Vogue), but sometimes you have to trick the camera."

CGI was used to dramatize the "infected," but not modify Smith's body. Producers considered it when challenged to add weight to his face as a time marker for flashback sequences. Smith declined faking it. To achieve that look, a few days prior to shooting Foster would wake Smith at 3 a.m.

"I'd feed him sushi with soy sauce and pizza. These foods make a body retain water, puffing it up so Will could appear ten pounds heavier in a day," Foster says.

(Memo to you: Avoid these high sodium foods days ahead of a special occasion to look leaner).

Once those shots were in the can, Foster tweaked Smith's diet.

"The next day we drain the water out." Healthy natural ways to get leaner fast include meals with asparagus (the vegetable extracts water from the body to reveal muscle definition) and dandelion tea, a popular diuretic.

These tricks got the 6'2", 184-pound actor's body fat down to 6%.

"Will lost 30 pounds, but looks even bigger now," Foster says.

I Am Legend explores if Robert Neville can he keep his sanity, courage and hope while trying to remain healthy and alive. Dieters understand the conundrum all too well. But, Smith is convinced the treadmill is the place where everyone can excel in life.

Smartly, Smith combines learning with exercise, listening to A Hero's Journey or subjects on filmmaking while running.

"If you've got books on tape, you can knock out 10 miles," Foster says. "Expanding your mind sends a signal to get on board and you want to get to the next chapter!"

WORDS OF WISDOM

Will Smith told Reader's Digest: "In one of my songs, I write, 'The key to life is on a treadmill. I'll just watch and learn while your chest burns. Because if you say you are going to run three miles and you only run two, I don't ever have to worry about losing something to you.' I started about five years ago. Running introduces you to your worst enemy, to that person who tells you, 'Ooh, our ankles hurt and we should stop. Why do we need to run five miles? Let us run three miles.' That is the same person who says to the man, 'Hey, your wife will never find out if you sleep with her,' and the same person who tells the 16-year-old, 'You are not gonna be cool if you do not smoke it.' If you start giving in to that person, you will never get to your goals."

http://www.edmontonsun.com/Lifestyle/Healt...716686-sun.html

[Jazzy Julie]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJAvUOO0z3E

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLT4prYKbDc

[Sandy]

Thanks for the interviews & videos. I think I posted the last one somewhere. Once I see the movie I'll read and see all this. I don't want to Know too much about the movie.

[viber_91]

found this pic. The "dark seekers" look kinda fake, but not as bad as everyone is saying. I guess i don't know much about cgi, and can't really see whats good and whats bad.

What do you guys think?

[Jazzy Julie]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bN1M2YZtfhk

interview starts at 1.27. and its really really short lol.

[viber_91]

Don't think that this has been posted...

Great video interiew with cast and director

http://media.movies.ign.com/media/771/7719...id_2228361.html

[viber_91]

The opening scene:

http://movies.yahoo.com/movie/1809768369/video/5453908

I'm so hyped for this movie, even tho it's getting mixed reviews. But hey, POH got pretty bad reveiws from like 35% of the reviewers and I liked that one, so...

[Ale]

NBC10.com

Lori goes to LA to interview Will Smith about his new movie:

http://video.nbc10.com/player/?id=194935

Funny interview! :lolsign: :thumbsup:

Edited December 13, 2007 by Ale