Resident Evil

 

We're back and this time I don't have one film to talk about but three films.  So let's jump right in.

 

Many years ago, I'm guessing sometime around '96 or '97, not too long after the first Play Station system was released by Sony there was a game called Resident Evil.  It was one of the first survival horror video game ever made.  I loved it, and I played it for may hours to the point I was calling out of work just to stay home and play this game.  The game concerned a zombie outbreak that was caused by a genetics experimental lab run by the Umbrella Corporation.  It has zombies, zombie dogs, zombie crows, super zombies, evil scientists, and other genetically modified baddies that included a plant I think.  The few characters that were playable in the beginning were Jill Valentine and Chris Redfield two members of the STARS team.  STARS stands for Special Tactics and Rescue Service.  Sort of like a zombie apocalypse military task force.  The game was fun, the game was creepy, and the game was hard.  At first at least, as nothing like it had been seen before.  As the years went by I played more versions of the game.  Part 2, part 3 were released a few years later.  Then the PS2 came out and suddenly Resident Evil was turned into a first person shooter where you needed the new gun controller to play the game.  Think Nintendo's Duck Hunt gun we had to play that game, it was similar to that.  And it sucked!  Sometime around 2000 Resident Evil 4 was released and while it was better than the shooter versions something was still missing.  I think there was at least one version that was playable online and then several others after that.  There were versions for Dream Cube, and other platforms however I only had them on PlayStation.  I still have one of them somewhere around my house that I don't think I ever played. Maybe number 6 I'm not sure.  They still release new games today as well as remakes of the original classics.  I completely recommend playing one of the first three if you were able to do so as they changed the way games were played and also had a role in bringing back the zombie genre to the forefront of horror.  Without a Resident Evil there may have never been The Walking Dead comic or TV show.

 

 

 

As Hollywood does, they eventually got their grubby little paws on the franchise and kinda ruined it.  As Hollywood does.  I remember when the first film was released over twenty years ago and it starred Mila Jovovich in the lead role as Alice.  First red flag as I didn't remember there being a character called Alice in the games I had played.  Well it turns out she is an amalgamation of three of the game franchises female characters.  Jill Valentine, as I mentioned before, Claire Redfield who is the sister to Chris who I also mentioned before, and a third character Ada Wong who I vaguely remember as she came much later in the series.  Maybe the third game but I'm not sure.  The sets and the special effects are pretty good but the story is just average.  It also starred Michelle Rodriguez before she was Ana Lucia in LOST.

 

 

Then came the second film in the series, Resident Evil: Apocalypse that I just now got around to watching, nearly twenty years after it was released.  While it gave me a nice sense of nostalgia and it sure had me thinking about looking for whatever version of the game I have today and popping that sucker into my PS4 (I still haven't splurged for a PS5, I haven't played much at all in the past five years or so) and diving back into that world.  The second film does have Jill Valentine as a character this time but again, meh.  I don't know, there's just something missing for me.  I will say the Nemesis character that is in the game is impressive here.  I mean it IS the creature from the game in just about every way but he is only in the film for about 15 minutes.  There just feels like there is some sort of disconnect.  I almost feel like Alexander Witt who was mostly a camera operator and a second unit director who gets his first chance to helm a major motion picture never played any of the games.  The characters are good but I think that's mostly due to costuming, I mean everyone looks like they should be a Resident Evil character and the Jill Valentine actress looks as though she stepped out of the game and into the film.  Again, it's just very average for me.  Does nothing to really impress me and by the time it gets good, it's almost over.

 

 

I was not deterred however, I went right in for the third film of the series Resident Evil: Extinction released in 2007 and directed by Russell Mulcahy (Highlander and Teen Wolf: The Movie).  This one also stars Jovovich as Alice and it also stars Ali Larter as Claire Redfield.  This Claire is nothing like the Claire I remember from the game but Larter does a good job with what she was given.  This one felt a little better to me, it seems that perhaps Mulcahy is familiar with the source material.  I mean depending on how you look at it, making a film based on a popular game has got to be a damned if you do; damned if you don't situation.  You can't go into it thinking just because millions of people play the games they will come to see the film.  And you certainly can't think because the game is good the movie will be good no matter what is thrown up on a movie screen.  Just because a film in any genre does millions of dollars in ticket sales doesn't mean it's a good film.  The thinking I feel many horror creators suffer from today is that if they put it on film, label it horror, people will love it.  Not so much, and that has been the case for quite awhile.  We won't get into the lost art of the horror movie, I don't have that much time. 

 

So I watched those two and I decided to give the first one another look as I haven't seen Resident Evil since it came out in 2002 as I mentioned before.  Originally, I gave the first installment two out of five stars so let's see it again with eyes belonging to someone who hasn't been in the world of Resident Evil for longer than I can remember.  Aside from Jovovich and Rodriguez the film also stars James Purefoy (A Knight's Tale and the HBO series Rome where he portrayed Marc Anthony) as Spencer Parks, another character that is not in any of the games that I recall.  I will say one thing, at least they got the red dress right.  Throughout the first three films Jovovich is seen wearing a short and tight red dress with spaghetti straps.  It's a thing of beauty, and while Jovovich could afford to eat a few sandwiches IMO, she still looks incredible in it.  In the game series it is Ada Wong's main outfit.  By comparison most of the first film takes place in an Umbrella Corporation lab where the virus first escapes.  The second film Apocalypse takes place mostly on the streets of Raccoon City.  The third film Extinction is located mostly in the Mojave desert in and around Las Vegas.  That makes the first two installments very dark for most of the films run time.  The third one at least most of it happens outside in the daylight where I can see most of what is happening.  The best thing I can say is keep in mind these films are loosely based on the game series so if you're going in looking for film versions of the games you will be disappointed.  Looking for a zombie apocalypse series of films, you should be okay but YMMV as there are other series of zombie films that are leaps and bounds better than these but let's give them some scores.

 

 

I think when I first watched Resident Evil back in 2002 maybe I went to the movies to see another extension of the original game I loved so much back in 1996 (or thereabout) and was disappointed with what I got.  Maybe even angry about it but like I said I gave it two stars back then and while I didn't change much in how I felt about it I did like it a little more than I did twenty years ago.  So I'll go two and a half little red dresses out of five for the original film in the series.

 

The second film Apocalypse, is the least gooder of the first three.  Even if it does have the guy that played Scut Farkus from A Christmas Story in it, and how many other people besides me always thought his name was Scott Farkus.  He's in it for about ten minutes anyway, it's still not good.  I'm gonna give this one and a half vials of T-virus out of five.

 

 

 

The third film brings one of the better characters from the first film, that being Olivera a police officer from Raccoon City.  Olivera is played by Oded Fehr from The Mummy and The Mummy Returns. And it also brings one of the least favorite characters from the second film that being LJ as played by Mike Epps from The Hangover and The Hangover II.  LJ is a civilian with a really cool set of gold guns that we first meet handcuffed to a bench in a police station at the beginning of Apocalypse.  He could have stayed there for all I care, his character was more annoying than anything.  Here he is a little less annoying at least.  The good thing again about this one is the big bad Tyrant creature we get and is sort of like the Nemesis monster from the previous one.  I'll go two and a half mutated zombie crows out of five for Extinction.

I gotta say if you're a fan of the games, Jovovich, or just a zombie addict you can see how far into the series you get before you call it quits but for my money I'll go for any of the Romero films or the 28 Days Later films.  Or binge watch the first season of The Walking Dead because without the Resident Evil game series Rick Grimes may not have ever existed.