I Don't Believe in This Afterlife

Paul W.S. Anderson claims to be a "big fan" of the Resident Evil games, however like a father encouraging his son to live his life while he constantly undermines everything he does, his actions betray his words.  I'm sure his intentions are good, but as they say, the road to hell is paved in good intentions.  Apologists for his Resident Evil movies will say "lighten up, it's based on a video game, it doesn't have to be smart." I'm so tired of that argument.  Just because a movie's based on a video game, doesn't mean it has to be mindless action with no coherent plot.   Roger Ebert once said video games will never be art.  That may be true, but most of them do have a story to tell.  And if these stories are to be given any justice on the big screen, filmmakers can't shit the source material.  The worst thing about this is that I had to pay 3D prices to see this movie (it's not being shown in a regular format). So am I going to have to buy a 3D TV to watch this when it comes out on DVD? Not likely, because I'm never going to watch this movie again.

Alice (Milla Jovovich), the main character of the previous installments returns in this one looking prettier than ever.  She has ruby-red lipstick, makes a "duck-face" when she fights, and wears a designer pilot outfit.  In a post-apocalyptic world infested with zombies, who has time to get dressed specifically to fly a plane? Even her clones all have matching outfits, hairdos, and flawless skin. We get it Paul Anderson, your wife is hot, can we move along with the movie please? Anyway, the beginning of the movie takes place in Japan.  The Alice clones infiltrate Umbrella's underground facility in an attempt to enact their revenge on one Albert Wesker (Shawn Roberts who does a commendable portrayal).  What's not clear is what is Wesker's position in Umbrella's corporate structure? We don't know, but the clones need someone to blame.  They wreck havoc on the facility, and kill the guards using guns, throwing stars, psychic abilities, and slow-motion.  These clones treat their lives with reckless abandon; jumping backwards out of a window while shooting at nothing,and detonating explosives in close proximity to themselves.  When one dies, another takes it's place.  It's okay, because all know clones have no soul.  Once the kamikaze clones do their job, we're conveniently left with one Alice to follow.  Somehow, she makes it to Alaska on a single engine plane and while there she meets up with an old friend, Claire Redfield (Ali Larter).  However, something has happened to Claire that prevents the two of them from catching up on old times.  Good, because who wants the character's gap between "Extinction" and "Afterlife" to be bridged with needless dialog?  In any event, after this non-reunion, and without refueling, they fly to LA in search of the fabled safe haven known as "Arcadia."

While in LA, they "crash" land on the roof of a building, and meet up with a group of survivors.  This group include a Hollywood producer (Kim Coates), a struggling actress (Kacey Barnfield), and a famous athlete (Boris Kodjoe) to name a few.  Apparently LA is filled with cliche archetypes.  They use an unnecessarily 30-story high prison as a place of refuge from the zombies, and the interior of this prison has like 100 torches scattered about.  At the bottom of the prison, locked in a cage, is Chris Redfield (Prison Break's Wentworth Miller).  Oh I get it; Wentworth Miller played a character known for breaking out prisons and Chris... Forget it.  Chris and Claire are siblings, but you wouldn't know it by the way they act.  At least Claire has a reason for being emotionally distant.  The group finds the location of Acadia, and have to fight their way through hordes of zombies, and a curiously placed hooded axeman, known as the "Executioner" in the games, to make it there.  Wait, why is there an axeman in the middle of LA in the first place?

That's what this movie does, it treats the game like a bargain bin and takes the elements deemed "cool" and shoehorns them in without any explanation, or context.  Nothing is explained; I know what they mean because I played and beat EVERY GAME in the series.  Paul Anderson, who only directed this and the first installment, but who has written the screenplay for every single one makes these movies stand-alone.  Meaning, each movie feels self-contained and doesn't carry on from the previous installment.  Any connection between the movies is tenuous at best.  Characters are just empty shells being used as nothing but props in the action scenes.  Alice is the only consistent character, and she's as lifeless as the zombies shes killing.  She herself is a killing machine; she only gets more powerful with every movie.  And any gamer would agree it's no fun playing a game that provides no challenge, likewise, its no fun watching a movie in which the hero/heroine go unchallenged.  The Resident Evil games pioneered the survival-horror genre.  In the older games, the ammo was scarce, the healing items where few and far between, and the enemies were powerful.  It put you in a constant state of danger and unease.  Hell, in order to conserve your ammo you couldn't kill everything you saw, sometimes you just had to run... That is unless you cheat.  And that's what Alice is, a cheat.  Instead of a main character that's fragile, and can be overwhelmed  at any time we're given one that does the overwhelming.  That would be okay if this movie wasn't called RESIDENT EVIL.  If you take away everything that's "Resident Evil" about these movies, aside from a few terms, nothing will have changed. And that's when you know something is wrong.  Another thing I had a problem with were Umbrella's motives.  First of all, this company seems to have unlimited resources.  They blow-up facilities that have a cost equal to that of the death star, but always have a backup facility to retreat to.  In the games Umbrella, and later Tricell, have unlimited resources, but they don't live in a post-apocalyptic world with no society and no economy in which to make money.  But the movie's Umbrella some how makes money while at the same time seem hellbent on destroying humanity.  So I guess they want to be the leading pharmaceutical company in a world devoid of human life? Makes sense.

Visually, this movie is much more crisp than the previous installments, but can't come close to the 3D in "Avatar."  In a lot of scenes, actors look like they were superimposed on the background.  And the depth of the 3D itself? Mediocre at best.  Paul Anderson has shown he could direct a good movie (see the criminally underrated Event Horizon), but in this movie he does too much of the same thing.  Every 5 minutes there's a slow-motion scene, and if there's a bullet fired or projectile thrown, you bet your ass we're following it's trajectory.  "I'm interested in the fate of this particular bullet."  This is only slightly better than those type of slow-motion scenes which look like they're missing a few frames.  The only thing I will give him credit for is a fight scene near the end of the movie; very stylish even though it was ripped straight from the game.

This movie, like the series as a whole, will divide fans of the Resident Evil video games.  It's sad to see what the movie franchise of my favorite video game series has become, but as long as they keep making money, they'll keep being made.  Paul Anderson wants to make 6 altogether.  With two to go, one can only hope that at least one of the two will do the video games some justice.  But by then they'll cease being "Resident Evil" movies and start to take on a life of their own...What am I thinking? They already have.

BACM Alert!: Since when could a black man dunk an airplane?