B Movie Fun

Since I read I am Legend by Richard Matheson as a RIP challenge book, and since my Bookman had read the book long ago, we rented the movie The Omega Man starring Charlton Heston. Talk about your B movie! There were great liberties taken with the story from the book. Instead of vampires the movie made them into regular people who just couldn't go out in daylight. But so you could tell the difference between the humans and those infected with the "plague," the plague people wore black robes and were powder white--white hair, white skin--even the black people were white. In the book, the hero, Robert Neville, really was the last human, but in the movie there had to be a love interest and this being the 1970s she's tough but couldn't make it alone, so there were a few others holed up outside of Los Angeles. Of course, the love interest doesn't work out and is the reason our hero gets killed in the end in a rather Christ-like performance. The acting is truly dreadful. In an attempt to make up for that fact, Heston is without his shirt quite frequently. However, he is past his prime and it would have been better if he kept his shirt on. The cool thing though is that the movie was filmed in Los Angeles. They must have closed off whole portions of the city to film Heston driving around downtown with no other cars on the street. And yet, even without LA traffic, Heston wrecks a nice convertible and flips a jeep. In the book, Robert Neville spends a lot of time wondering what the point of his survival is. Heston is much too manly for that and never doubts himself or his purpose for a single second. The Omega Man is one of those movies that is so bad it's good. And if you haven't read I am Legend, the movie won't give anything away.