Review: In all fairness, Resident Evil: Apocalypse isn't as bad as all the anal critics have said it was and it wasn't as good as what the fans say. The main question is: would this sequel have been better off it was directed by Paul "fuck up" Anderson after he completely flushed the great concept of Alien Vs. Predator down the toilet? I don't know and don't really care at this point since I want a director with talent to start making these sequels.
Apocalypse takes its cue from Resident Evil 3: Nemesis, which is easily the most action-heavy of the games. We have a bunch of super-cool monsters (Nemesis!), a ton of great weapons, a town full of zombies, and a para-military task force, so why didn't this film kick total ass? But before I touch on that, let me say this--why do people say this feels more like the video game?
Just because you cram a film full of stupid action sequences and wire kung-fu doesn't make it like a video game. What makes it like the video game is capturing the feel of what made the games great. I play the Resident Evil games, and I don't recall anybody kung-fu fighting zombies or running down the side of a building. Anyway, back on topic, all that stupid unecessary crap is what really ruined this film.
It's over-saturated with MTV-directing instead of focusing on atmosphere and making decent action sequences. All the fights were done with the same herky-jerky camera used in Alien Vs. Predator...the kind that make you want to throw up from motion sickness. Look, enough with this bullshit, I want to SEE the action not just a bunch of disorienting trails. It's not clever, artistic, or even good to look at, it's just fucking irritating.
Another thing that really ruined the action was the fact this film had next to zero gore. It feels like each of the characters say "fuck" just for the sake of padding this movie for a very weak R-rating. Oh, yeah, and zombie hookers are thrown in there for no apparent reason. Zombie flicks are supposed to be gory, so make with the goo already! Jesus, how can directors be so inept?
There are a lot of action sequences, so if you're not too picky about that kind of things, you might enjoy them. However, they're all really bland despite the frantic martial arts fighting and gunplay (think the craptacular film adaption of Charlie's Angels). Milla fights an army of zombies, spins off a motorcycle and shoots it (very hooky), and runs down the side of a building. Now you'd think all this would sound good, but to be honest it was nearly yawn-inducing.
Also, the concept of a town torn apart by monsters is criminally under-used. It should've been sprawling, but the film felt so contained that we might as well have gone back to the friggin' Hive. And where were the spiders and other trademark monsters? Well, at least they had the good sense to put in the Nemesis. The guy still kicked ass and that minigun they gave him was actually a good idea. On the downside, he looked a little too rubbery and at the end turned into a total pussy.
Ugh, did his cajones just magically fall or something towards the end? Atmosphere was severely lacking as well, everything looked as bland as the labs in the original. Why not give us some really scary locales? Yeah, there was a church and school, but those only got a few minutes of screen time. As far as performances go, Milla Jovovich I felt should not be in this movie. She really dragged the film down with her cheesy "one woman killing machine" act that just got on my nerves.
Whenever I was interested in the movie and it was trying to capture the atmosphere of the game, in would crash Milla shooting up the whole place. In one instance, Jill is about to blow up the school to kill some dogs...but her match goes out. Then out of friggin' nowhere comes Alice with a lighter blowing it sky high. Wow, good thing she just happens to smoke, eh? They couldn't let Jill or any of the other characters just finish a scene without Alice being a camera hog.
Which begs the question--if you were gonna shaft the main characters from the actual game in favor of a lame original character...why bother to include them? Sienna Guillory gave a surprisingly good performance as Jill Valentine. She even had the signature blue tank top from the game, glad to see somebody actually paid attention to the source material. She's pissed, knows just what's going on with the outbreak, and acts just like you'd expect her to act.
There's some female anchor, but she's just annoying zombie bait (note: if a kid doesn't respond to your calls in a zombie-infest school, chances are it's a zombie too). Oded Fehr manages to come off as an alright Carlos, but mostly just lets the haircut and guns do the acting. Unfortunately, they decided to put in an annoying sidekick called L.J. with a pair of solid gold pistols. Holy shit was this guy stereotypical and annoying to boot. I was honestly expecting him to say something like "that is whacked, yo!" but at least he didn't stoop to that level.
In the end, Resident Evil: Apocalypse serves a single purpose: to kill ninety minutes. Nothing more, nothing less. Everything just feels bland despite the killer concept behind it, though, it doesn't screw up anywhere near as bad as Alien Vs. Predator. It has some alright special effects, acting, and action sequences (cliched as they are). It's really not worth going to the theater to see, so in my opinion you'd be better to just see it on cable. So we have yet another mediocre video game movie on our hands. At least it's not a Double Dragon.