The Last Man on Earth | |
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![]() US film poster by Reynold Brown | |
Directed by | Sidney Salkow Ubaldo B. Ragona |
Screenplay by | Logan Swanson William F. Leicester Italian version: Furio M. Monetti Ubaldo B. Ragona |
Based on | I Am Legend 1954 novel by Richard Matheson |
Produced by | Robert L. Lippert |
Starring | Vincent Price Franca Bettoia Emma Danieli Giacomo Rossi Stuart |
Cinematography | Franco Delli Colli |
Edited by | Gene Ruggiero Italian version: Franca Silvi |
Music by | Paul Sawtell Bert Shefter |
Color process | Black and white |
Production companies | Associated Producers Inc. Produzioni La Regina |
Distributed by | American International Pictures |
Release date |
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Running time | 86 minutes |
Countries | United States Italy |
Languages | English Italian |
The Last Man on Earth is a 1964 post-apocalyptic science fiction horror film based on the 1954 novel I Am Legend by Richard Matheson. The film was produced by Robert L. Lippert and directed by Ubaldo Ragona and Sidney Salkow, and stars Vincent Price and Franca Bettoia. The screenplay was written in part by Matheson, but he was dissatisfied with the result and chose to be credited as "Logan Swanson". William Leicester, Furio M. Monetti, and Ubaldo Ragona finished the script.
The Last Man on Earth was filmed in Rome, with scenes being completed at Esposizione Universale Roma. It was released in the United States by American International Pictures. In the 1980s, the film entered the public domain. [1] [2] MGM Home Video, the current owners of the AIP film catalog, released a digitally remastered widescreen version of the film on DVD in September 2005.
It is 1968, and Dr. Robert Morgan lives in a world where everyone else has been infected by a plague that has turned them into undead, vampiric creatures that cannot stand sunlight, fear mirrors, and are repelled by garlic. They would kill Morgan if they could, but they are weak and unintelligent. Every day Morgan carries out the same routine: he wakes up, marks another day on the calendar, gathers his weapons, and then goes hunting for vampires, killing as many as he can and then burning the bodies to prevent them from coming back. At night, he locks himself inside his house.
A flashback sequence explains that, in December 1965, Morgan's wife Virginia and daughter Kathy had succumbed to the plague before it was widely known by the public that the dead would return to life. Instead of taking his wife to the same public burn pit used to dispose of his daughter's corpse, Morgan buried her without the knowledge of the authorities. When his wife returned to his home and attacked him, Morgan became aware of the need to kill the plague victims with a wooden stake. Morgan hypothesizes that he is immune to the bacteria from a bite by an infected vampire bat when he was stationed in Panama, which may have introduced a diluted form of the plague into his blood.
One day, a dog appears in the neighborhood. Desperate for companionship, Morgan chases after the dog but does not catch it. Sometime later the dog appears, wounded, at Morgan's doorstep. He takes the dog into his home and treats its wounds, looking forward to having company for the first time in three years. He quickly discovers, however, that it, too, has become infected with the plague. Morgan starts burying the dog which is now impaled with a wooden stake. He sinks further into depression and loneliness.
After burying the dog, Morgan spots a woman in the distance. The woman, Ruth, is terrified of Morgan at first sight and runs from him. Morgan convinces her to return to his home, but he is suspicious of her true nature. Ruth becomes ill when Morgan waves garlic in her face, but claims that she has a weak stomach. Morgan's suspicion that Ruth is infected is confirmed when he discovers her attempting to inject herself with a combination of blood and vaccine that holds the disease at bay. Ruth initially draws a gun on Morgan but ultimately surrenders it to him. She tells him that she is part of a group of people like her –infected, but under treatment –and was sent to spy on Morgan. The vaccine allows the people to function normally with the drug in the bloodstream, but once it wears off, the infection takes over the body again. Ruth explains that her people are planning to rebuild society as they destroy the remaining humans, and that many of the vampires Morgan killed were still alive. Ruth desperately urges Morgan to flee, but he inexplicably refuses.
While Ruth is asleep, Morgan transfuses his own blood into her. She is immediately cured, and Morgan sees hope that, together, they can cure the rest of her people. Moments later, however, Ruth's people attack. Morgan takes the gun and flees his home while the attackers kill the vampires gathered around Morgan's home. Ruth's people spot Morgan and chase him. He exchanges gunfire with them and picks up tear gas grenades from a police station armory along the way. While the tear gas delays his pursuers somewhat, Morgan is wounded by gunfire and retreats into a church. As he stands at the altar, one of his pursuers finally impales him with a thrown spear. In his final moments, Morgan denounces his pursuers as "freaks" and, as Ruth cradles him, declares that he is the last true man on Earth. As Ruth walks away from Morgan's body, she notices a baby crying and tries to assure the child that everyone is safe now.
Note that Carolyn De Fonseca, uncredited, dubbed for Franca Bettoia's voice in the English release of the film.
Producer Anthony Hinds purchased the rights to Matheson's novel for Hammer Film Productions. Matheson wrote a script, and Hammer announced in 1958 that they would make it. [3] However, British censors would not allow the film to be produced, so Hinds resold the script to American producer Robert L. Lippert.
Lippert had wanted to make a "last man on Earth"-type film for a while. In the late 1950s, Charles Marquis Warren and Robert Stabler optioned a novel by science fiction writer George R. Stewart called Earth Abides . Harry Spalding, who worked for Lippert, said the release of The World, the Flesh and the Devil (1959) killed off plans for that project. Spalding then read Matheson's novel and suggested Lippert film that book instead. [4] The project was announced in August 1962.
Lippert originally told Matheson that Fritz Lang would direct the film, and Matheson thought that would be "wonderful". Eventually, however, Sidney Salkow was chosen to direct. Matheson made the follow-up comment: "Well, there's a bit of a drop." [5]
To save money, the film was shot in Italy with a predominantly Italian cast and crew. [6] [7] The climax was shot in San Pio X alla Balduina, a real Catholic church in Rome. [8] [9] [10]
Matheson later said the film was the most faithful adaptation of his book, but he also called the result "inept" and used a pen name for his screenplay. (He later said he thought Harrison Ford as star and George Miller as director would have been the ideal creative combination".) [5]
In 2024, Waxwork Records released the soundtrack as part of the Rob Zombie Presents series. It was pressed on coloured vinyl and housed in special packaging featuring artwork by Graham Humphreys. [11]
There are several differences between the film and the novel I Am Legend from which it is based:
Although the film was not considered a success upon its release, it later gained a more favorable reputation as a classic of the genre. [12] As of March 2024, The Last Man on Earth holds a 79% rating at the film review aggregator Web site Rotten Tomatoes from 28 reviews. [13] Phil Hall of Film Threat called The Last Man on Earth "the best Vincent Price movie ever made". [12]
Among the less favorable reviews, Steve Biodrowski of Cinefantastique felt the film was "hampered by an obviously low budget and some poorly recorded, post-production dubbing that creates an amateurish feel, undermining the power of its story", [14] while Jonathan Rosenbaum of the Chicago Reader remarked, "Some would consider this version better than the 1971 remake with Charlton Heston, The Omega Man , but that isn't much of an achievement". [15]
Among the film's creators, Price "had a certain fondness for the film" and felt it was better than The Omega Man. [14] Richard Matheson co-wrote the film's screenplay, but was unhappy with the results. To keep receiving residual income from the film, though, he had to be credited, so he used the name "Logan Swanson", a combination of his wife's mother's maiden name and his mother's maiden name. [16] Matheson said: "I was disappointed in the film, even though they more or less followed my story. I think Vincent Price, whom I love in every one of his pictures that I wrote, was miscast. I also felt the direction was kind of poor. I just didn’t care for it." [17]
Richard Burton Matheson was an American author and screenwriter, primarily in the fantasy, horror, and science fiction genres.
I Am Legend is a 1954 post-apocalyptic horror novel by American writer Richard Matheson that was influential in the modern development of zombie and vampire literature and in popularizing the concept of a worldwide apocalypse due to disease. The novel was a success and was adapted into the films The Last Man on Earth (1964), The Omega Man (1971), and I Am Legend (2007). It was also an inspiration for George A. Romero's Night of the Living Dead (1968).
Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a subgenre of science fiction in which the Earth's civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astronomical, such as an impact event; destructive, such as nuclear holocaust or resource depletion; medical, such as a pandemic, whether natural or human-caused; end time, such as the Last Judgment, Second Coming or Ragnarök; or any other scenario in which the outcome is apocalyptic, such as a zombie apocalypse, cybernetic revolt, technological singularity, dysgenics or alien invasion.
Vincent Leonard Price Jr. was an American actor known for his work in the horror film genre, mostly portraying villains. He appeared on stage, television, and radio, and in more than 100 films. Price has two stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, one for motion pictures and one for television.
The Omega Man is a 1971 American post-apocalyptic action film directed by Boris Sagal and starring Charlton Heston as a survivor of a pandemic. It was written by John William Corrington and Joyce Corrington, based on the 1954 novel I Am Legend by Richard Matheson. The film's producer, Walter Seltzer, went on to work with Heston again in the dystopian science-fiction film Soylent Green in 1973.
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Vampires are frequently represented in popular culture across various forms of media, including appearances in ballet, films, literature, music, opera, theatre, paintings, and video games.
The Comedy of Terrors is a 1963 American International Pictures horror comedy film directed by Jacques Tourneur and starring Vincent Price, Peter Lorre, Basil Rathbone, Boris Karloff and Joe E. Brown in his final film appearance. It is a blend of comedy and horror that features several cast members from Tales of Terror, a 1962 film also released by AIP.
I Am Legend is a 2007 American post-apocalyptic action thriller film directed by Francis Lawrence from a screenplay by Akiva Goldsman and Mark Protosevich and starring Will Smith as US Army virologist Robert Neville. Loosely based on the 1954 novel of the same name by Richard Matheson, the film is set in New York City after a virus, which was originally created to cure cancer, has wiped out most of mankind, leaving Neville as the last human in New York, other than nocturnal mutants. Neville is immune to the virus, and he works to develop a cure while defending himself against the hostile mutants. It is the third feature-film adaptation of Matheson's novel following 1964's The Last Man on Earth and 1971's The Omega Man.
Peeps is a 2005 novel by Scott Westerfeld revolving around a parasite which causes people to become cannibalistic and repelled by that which they once loved. It follows the protagonist, Cal Thompson, as he lives with this parasite and tries to uncover a possible threat to the whole population of the world. The apocalyptic threat to the world that begins in Peeps continues in The Last Days, which featured some of the same characters.
Zombie apocalypse is a subgenre of apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction in which society collapses due to overwhelming swarms of zombies. Typically only a few individuals or small bands of survivors are left living. In some versions, the reason the dead rise and attack humans is unknown, in others, a parasite or infection is the cause, framing events much like a plague. Some stories have every corpse rise, regardless of the cause of death, whereas others require exposure to the infection.
The Last Dog on Earth is a 2003 young adult novel written by Daniel Ehrenhaft. It follows Logan, a lonely 14-year-old boy who adopts a dog from an animal shelter and names her Jack. The pair's relationship is soon threatened by an incurable prion disease spreading across the nation. Infected dogs become unnaturally violent and bloodthirsty, culminating in the deaths of several people. As public fear heightens and the government intervenes to control the outbreak, Logan struggles to reform his life and remain with Jack.
Sidney Salkow was an American film director, screenwriter, and television director.
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Franca Bettoia is an Italian actress known for her role as Ruth Collins in the film The Last Man on Earth.
I Am Omega, stylized as I Am Ωmega, is a 2007 American direct-to-DVD post-apocalyptic science fiction thriller film produced by The Asylum and starring Mark Dacascos. The film is an unofficial and uncredited adaptation of the 1954 novel I Am Legend by Richard Matheson, the title being a reference to the 1971 film adaptation The Omega Man. The movie was intentionally released as a "mockbuster" to capitalize on the release of the theatrical film I Am Legend of the same year.
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