For Thursday:
Check out The Omega Man, starring Charlton Heston. This is the 1971 remake of Matheson’s I Am Legend. You can view the full movie here. (The motherblog will request a password, and the password is: “Omega” (without quote marks).). See notes on the movie page if you seem to be having playback problems.
Our asynchronous learning event for Thursday’s class is this – – compare one motif across all of our versions (so far) of I Am Legend. Here’s how to do it:
- first, select one motif or element from our previous versions of I Am Legend. Here’s a list of some possible motifs/elements: “the car,” “the house,” “Robert Neville” (external traits like wardrobe, physical type, speech, etc.), “the city,” “the vamp/monster,” “soundtrack,” “opening sequence,” “the new Eve” (my moniker for the various versions of Ruth from I Am Legend), etc.
- second, after selecting one motif, create a new entry in your google doc. This is where you will compare your motif or element across all versions of I Am Legend. Compare the motif by paying careful attention to the concrete differences and similarities among the versions of the I Am Legend narrative, i.e. “the car” in Matheson, Last Man on Earth, and Omega Man, etc. Describe and note these differences and similarities in your google doc. Probably, you can just use phrases or even adjectives to describe these differences/similarities.
- finally, reflect a little on the differences and/or similarities you see. What do these tell us about shifting genres for the narrative? What do they say about the different historical contexts of each version? What do they tell us about the shifts in thematic focus as the narrative “mutates” across time? This reflection should be in standard, written prose and will probably require more than 250 words.
Try to complete this analysis by Saturday afternoon.
When we meet next Tuesday, you’ll want to have viewed the latest version of I Am Legend, the 2007 movie starring Will Smith. You can view this version here. (Password: “Legend”). On Tuesday, we’ll try to discuss the whole oeuvre inspired by Matheson’s original novella as well as its significance as one central strand in the post-apocalyptic genre.
Questions? Let me know.