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[Resident Evil:Afterlife]
Plot:In a world ravaged by a virus infection, turning its victims into the Undead, ALICE (Milla Jovovich), continues on her journey to find survivors and lead them to safety. Her deadly battle with the Umbrella Corporation reaches new heights, but Alice gets some unexpected help from an old friend. A new lead that promises a safe haven from the Undead leads them to Los Angeles, but when they arrive the city is overrun by thousands of Undead and Alice and her comrades are about to step into a deadly trap.
Cast:Milla Jovovich,
Boris Kodjoe,
Wentworth Miller,
Ali Larter,
Spencer Locke,
Kim Coates,
Shawn Roberts,
Norman Yeung,
Kacey Barnfield.
My Thoughts:Skinning the cat.
Review:It's been three years since the last "Resident Evil" film, which was "Extinction". Now...in 2010, Alice and friends are back. And this time, they're bringing the gun-slinging, flying bullets, and ass-kickery in 3D. Why? Well, 3D has made a comeback over the past few years, but also...the 3D was obviously a gimmick to hide some huge issues with a series that seems to be running out of steam and ideas, fast. "Afterlife" does do one thing very well however, it keeps continuity alive and well from the third movie. "Afterlife" kicks off by introducing us to an opening scene in Tokyo Japan, where the third movie left off. Tokyo, last we saw it, was overrun by zombies.
But in "Afterlife", that's revealed to be just some parts of Tokyo, as the opening scene shows us a zombie going on the attack against citizenry during a rainy evening. After that, we meet Albert Wesker, now played by Shawn Roberts. Wesker's digs have come under attack mysteriously by an unseen enemy. Said enemy are later revealed to be those pesky Alice clones. Wesker immediately takes control of the situation in typical "Resident Evil" fashion. Barking orders, demanding his men defeat the clones, and even busting a cap in one of his henchmen when he doesn't follow a certain order.
The Alice clones at this point have seemed to grow better as fighters, as they go all "Ultraviolet" on Wesker's men, and do manage to reach Wesker, but not before he can make one of those A-typical evil genius-villain escapes in a cool black chopper-like contraption. During the escape, Wesker is confronted by yet another Alice, who may or may not be the real Alice. But we also learn Wesker has taken precautions for this confrontation, as he now has the T-Virus running through him. But unlike Alice, it's fighting for control of him, instead of perfectly and fluidly bonding with his DNA, like it did with Alice's. So the underlying theme of Alice's importance to Umbrella is seen in "Afterlife" yet again, and probably explains why these guys just can't seem to kill Alice.
They obviously want her alive, not for a lack of trying though. "Afterlife" jumps all over the place though, and is not as tightly written as "Extinction" was. The movie has Alice arriving via plane at Arcadia, the safehouse mentioned in part 3, located in Alaska. Only Alice arrives to find Arcadia is not at all what it was promised to be. And she also comes under attack. This then sends Alice and her attacker to Los Angeles to scoop up some more survivors. A move which doesn't come without it's own issues considering the prison where Alice decides to land at is surrounded by zombies, who have entered the newest stage of T-virus evolution, the aforementioned mangini undead.
One of the biggest issues with this movie is the backgrounds and set pieces. The inside set pieces work, but outside you can tell there was some digital effects used for the backgrounds. And nothing looks worse than digitized outside-environment in a film. Even in 3D, this simply does not work. Milla Jovovich plays Alice really well again, but as for everyone else...they kind of seem overshadowed by Alice. It's hard to get to know other characters in a film that has one character riding roughshot over everyone else. Ali Larter's "Afterlife" Claire is even worse than her "Extinction" Claire.
In this movie, something happens to Claire which keeps her out of the action until the middle of the picture. And the newbies Alice meets, and tries to rescue are a bad mix of personalities, which results in little to no unity among the new group. Then we get her brother Chris who just looks angry all the time, and never really does much of anything of value. The zombies this time around oddly enough, are underused. The first three movies overused the zombies, but part 4 actually under-uses them. Oddly enough. As for the movies obligatory boss monster, this time around it's the Executioner, a huge beast with an axe-like weapon.
Despite no explanation about how the monster even got to Los Angeles to begin with, it's battle with Claire and Alice is a decent thrilling few minutes. But it's mostly smoke and mirrors and "almosts"...as in it nearly kills Alice and Claire about 5 times each. But give me Alice vs. Tyrant/Dr. Isaac's or Alice vs. Nemesis from "Apocalypse" any day. "Afterlife" does offer some new revelations about Umbrella. We find out that they've found new ways to do the whole cheesy mind-control thing on people, we find out their ties to Arcadia, and we also find out their real base of operations.
But when the ending rolls around, it zooms by so quickly if you blink you'll miss it. Somehow they manage to cram What should've been a 30 minute finale, into 10 minutes of "Matrix-y" type stuff with Wesker battling what's remaining of the good guys. This coming after the remaining good guys discover a few more dark secrets about Umbrella, and a face from the past shows up to play a major role in how things are finished up. The movies ultimate end comes on a very strange note and there's a scene about a few minutes into the end credits that makes things even weirder. No doubt we'll probably see another one of these movies in the next two or three years.
I just hope the next one expands on other people besides Alice. "Afterlife" is really one of the only films in the series for full-on "Resident Evil" movie fans and Milla Jovovich fans. Anyone who didn't like "Extinction" or "Apocalypse", will undoubtedly hate this movie. It corrects none of the issues from either of those two films, and instead gets only more unreal and abnormal.
Positives:The executioner was a great monster, and the sets sued for the jail and Wesker's lair were awesome. The films opening 10 minutes was good.
Negatives:This film focuses too much on Alice, and for some reason has forgotten about her powers from part 3. The final battle with Wesker versus the good guys, should've been way longer than it was. The Executioner scene should've been longer, and the digital backgrounds used for post-apocalyptic L.A. sucked.
Overall:Two stars out of four.
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