The Omega Man

This 1971 adaptation of the Richard Matheson novella I Am Legend diverges greatly from the source. The 1964 version, The Last Man on Earth, starring Vincent Price, is, on the other hand, nearly a direct translation. And the earlier is definitely much better, despite its novelistic tendencies... The greatest change lies in the nature of the "plagued" citizens, who, rather than becoming vampires, are a race of people sensitive to the light and averse to the technological developments of modern man. Neville is no longer their enemy because he is human and food, but because he represents what the "Family" believes is the cause of their plight - progress. The Family also represent one of the film's greatest weaknesses in visual effectiveness and general lameness. 

The racial aspect is difficult to read; while Charlton Heston gets freaky with a hot black woman, she begins by calling him "the Man, literally" and "motha" and I believe I also heard the word "jive," never a good sign. Furthermore, she chooses to go white before the final rescue, in which Neville is left lying prone in a fountain, painfully obviously posed as the dying Christ. Earlier in the film, one of the surviving children asks Neville, "Are you God?" And he just looks at her and slowly turns away, not even denying it. Clearly, he IS the problem, not merely a survivor but a scientifically-minded antagonist to the cause of the albino people of the night. I fell asleep a couple of times. The couch was warm and soft... and the movie just wasn't that great.