Actor Will Smith waltzes into the press conference as if he were the living embodiment of his character in his latest film, I Am Legend - here to save Hollywood from a bad case of the box office flu.
Smith shakes every hand, shouts "WHEE" several times and declares, "I'm excited to see me!"
In fact, the opposite is true. Hollywood is excited to see him and expects a big holiday present from the science-fiction movie that debuts in Taiwan today.
"This is the movie we need at this time, the right movie in the right place with the right star," said Paul Dergarabedian, president of box office tracker Media by Numbers.
Some experts think I Am Legend, in which Smith portrays a scientist who is the only survivor of a virus that wipes out the population of New York City, will gross as much as US$50 million by the end of its first weekend in theaters.
That figure would fall short of the US December opening of 2003's The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King which had nearly US$73 million. Nevertheless, it would bring glad tidings to theater owners who have seen ticket sales slump 7 percent this holiday season compared to last year.
Last year, Smith was an Oscar contender with his serious drama, The Pursuit of Happyness, and in 2001 he fought for Academy Award gold playing boxer Muhammad Ali in the biopic Ali.
But his 2007 big-budget holiday film is not about winning awards so much as doing what he does best in action adventure films - delighting movies fans and helping box offices, too.
If similar movies such as I, Robot (US$144 million) and Independence Day (US$306 million) are any indication, theater owners should feel confident.
Based on Richard Matheson's 1954 novel of the same name, I Am Legend gives Smith the type of role that has inspired many a science fiction film. Robert Neville (Smith) is oddly immune to the virus that has devastated New York City.
Neville believes he may be the only man left in the world until he becomes stalked by mutant victims of the virus. Then, the noble scientist tries to develop a vaccine.
Kirk Honeycutt, film critic of the Hollywood Reporter, said that "Smith ... delivers an extraordinary performance as a man slowly coming unglued under the strain of no human contact and a constantly alternating role of hunter and prey."
For more than half the film, Neville walks around a desolated New York City talking to himself and to his dog, so the success of the movie rests squarely on Smith's shoulders.
With good early reviews, Smith seems to have earned another success, but that should surprise no one. He is Hollywood's symbol of likability.
Honeycutt also raves about "the knockout production design," camera movement and musical score that combine to "create a New York City that is a literally an urban jungle."
But re-creating the city in shambles raised the hackles of a lot of New Yorkers who did not like to see their streets closed just so someone could make a movie.
"It was the most amount of middle fingers I ever gave or received," Smith told reporters at his news conference. "I am used to people liking me."
But by the end of shooting he was thinking he may have lost his popularity. This weekend, he will find out.
I AM LEGEND
DIRECTED BY: FRANCIS LAWRENCE
STARRING: WILL SMITH (ROBERT NEVILLE), ALICE BRAGA (ANNA), CHARLIE TAHAN (ETHAN), SALLI RICHARDSON (ZOE), WILLOW SMITH (MARLEY), DARRELL FOSTER (MIKE)
Running time: 106 minutes
TAIWAN RELEASE: TODAY
A few weeks ago I found myself at a Family Mart talking with the morning shift worker there, who has become my coffee guy. Both of us were in a funk over the “unseasonable” warm weather, a state of mind known as “solastalgia” — distress produced by environmental change. In fact, the weather was not that out of the ordinary in boiling Central Taiwan, and likely cooler than the temperatures we will experience in the near-future. According to the Taiwan Adaptation Platform, between 1957 and 2006, summer lengthened by 27.8 days, while winter shrunk by 29.7 days. Winter is not
Taiwan’s post-World War II architecture, “practical, cheap and temporary,” not to mention “rather forgettable.” This was a characterization recently given by Taiwan-based historian John Ross on his Formosa Files podcast. Yet the 1960s and 1970s were, in fact, the period of Taiwan’s foundational building boom, which, to a great extent, defined the look of Taiwan’s cities, determining the way denizens live today. During this period, functionalist concrete blocks and Chinese nostalgia gave way to new interpretations of modernism, large planned communities and high-rise skyscrapers. It is currently the subject of a new exhibition at the Taipei Fine Arts Museum, Modern
March 25 to March 31 A 56-year-old Wu Li Yu-ke (吳李玉哥) was straightening out her artist son’s piles of drawings when she inadvertently flipped one over, revealing the blank backside of the paper. Absent-mindedly, she picked up a pencil and recalled how she used to sketch embroidery designs for her clothing business. Without clients and budget or labor constraints to worry about, Wu Li drew freely whatever image came to her mind. With much more free time now that her son had found a job, she found herself missing her home village in China, where she
In recent years, Slovakia has been seen as a highly democratic and Western-oriented Central European country. This image was reinforced by the election of the country’s first female president in 2019, efforts to provide extensive assistance to Ukraine and the strengthening of relations with Taiwan, all of which strengthened Slovakia’s position within the European Union. However, the latest developments in the country suggest that the situation is changing rapidly. As such, the presidential elections to be held on March 23 will be an indicator of whether Slovakia remains in the Western sphere of influence or moves eastward, notably towards Russia and