David O'ConnellResident Evil: Afterlife
October 12th 2010 02:40
There’s a moment half an hour into Resident Evil: Afterlife in which a lonesome Milla Jovovich is seen talking into a video camera to record her thoughts for posterity. ‘I don’t know how much longer I can do this,” she says. Is she talking as her character ‘Alice’ or this Milla herself in career contemplation mode? A model turned actress, once with pretensions of making it big, she now seems to have fallen into a rut which intermittent chapters of the Resident Evil saga can hardly rescue her from.
This series dropped off the radar for me after the first film but this return to the big screen, beefed up with the allure of its 3D enhancements, called out eerily to me. Milla fighting the undead in a third dimension? Sign me up, I murmured, even as I noticed Paul W.S. Anderson at the helm of this potential shipwreck. And true to form, he delivers the ‘goods’ with a shallow, stylistic piece of B-grade trash. But damned if I didn’t half enjoy this.................I said half enjoyed it. I’m not deluding myself that it reaches any great artistic heights, but it must be said that far trashier horror films have made it to the big screen in recent years. And let me state it again: Milla in 3D!! Could it really be a chore?
The film opens with a frenetic set-piece featuring an army of Alice clones descending on the underground Tokyo headquarters of the evil Umbrella organisation. The place ends up blown to smithereens but the real Alice escapes with the evil Wesker (Shaun Roberts, doing an absurdly ultra-serious Christian Bale impersonation). Their aircraft crashes, killing both presumably, but Alice somehow staggers from the wreck and heads for a utopia called Arcadia where she hopes to find survivors. All she finds are empty planes and a rabid Claire (Ali Larter).
Together they head to Los Angeles (a cured Claire suddenly 'dolled up' after looking like she just crawled out of a hole moments earlier) where almost the entire city is a smoldering ruin. But at the first sign of life she posits her big bird down on the roof of an abandoned prison building where a group of survivors have been detained by the infested zombie millions mindlessly patrolling the grounds below. These include beefed up Luther (Boris Kodjoe), arrogant former producer Bennett (Kim Coates) and a former prisoner they've isolated, Chris (Wentworth Miller).
Arcadia is really a ship on the outskirts of the city, Alice and Claire are informed. Alaska was a long way to go. Anyway, they’re here now. But can they uncover a means of getting aboard the ship to investigate the signal which offers them their only ray of hope without becoming zombie food? Cue inventive, outlandish slaughter as the numbers dwindle and the infected gain access inside their fortress.
Ali and Milla: you can keep pouring water over this scene all day long as far as I'm concerned. 
Anderson employs plenty of empty but flashy, Matrix-style, slow-mo action moves as Milla and her cohorts dodge the rampaging viral opponents in this latest incarnation of Capcom’s long-running videogame series. There’s even a great Boss-level in which a giant ‘Axeman’ comes sauntering in with a bag over his head and the biggest axe in the universe in an attempt to lop off their heads with a flick of his wrist. He’s one mean bastard but no match for the combined talents of Milla and Ali, especially once Anderson has drenched them in water and allowed their close-fitting outfits to strangle their anatomies, raising male scrutiny to extreme levels.
The score by Tomandandy is about as unsubtle as anything you’ll ever hear in a film. Brash, simplistic and intrusive it provides great service if you like to watch action scenes to the tune of what heavy metal and electronica bands sound like when their vocalists are away on holidays.
Forget about a neatly tied-up resolution; instead we’re left with a very open ending, setting the scene for the inevitable next chapter. Yes, of course there's going to be a next chapter. Milla’s got to eat too you know. Like I said, Resident Evil: Afterlife (2010) is trash but I openly admit I stayed awake and alert for its entire 90 minutes. I can’t recommend it exactly but then you can’t expect filet mignon every night of the week. Occasionally you just have to be grateful for any kind of sustenance.
Resident Evil: Afterlife opens in Australia this Thursday, October 14.
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Comment by Matt Shea
Comment by Bryn
Horrorphile
I reviewed the others all in a row; Resident Evil, Apocalypse, and Extinction.
Comment by David O'Connell
20/20 Filmsight
Screen Fanatic
Bryn, that's brilliant mate, I need to look over all those reviews to see if the 2nd and 3rd are worth watching. Ali? yes, I'll second that. What a very sweet girl. I can't comment about whether this is the trashiest but it did cost 60 mill and some of the action set-pieces, as stupid as they are, are pretty damn good fun. A lot more fun that watching Julia Roberts' mouth consume a pizza whole and then tell me she doesn't care if it makes her fat.
Comment by Deni
Abstract Magick
Cinema Herald
Nice write up.
Comment by ShaunK
Screen Adventure
Actually so is Ali Larter - but my word she's pleasant to look at.
Comment by JohnDoe
Film & TV on DVD
The first Resident evil was a trashy treat with those Hounds from hell and Michelle Rodriguez,
Unfortunately I saw the other sequels and still don't know why. Will be steering clear of this one.
As for the Milla Jovovich discussion she was once showing potential but has lost all the goodwill she accumlated. I enjoyed her in Kuffs, Dazed and Confused, Joan of Arc, Million Dollar Hotel, The Claim, Dummy and Chaplin. In other words films where her appearance was brief in both senses of the word.
As for Larter, atrocious actor that never showed potential but has a nice physique.
Comment by David O'Connell
20/20 Filmsight
Screen Fanatic
Interesting how you put Michelle Rodriguez and hounds from hell in the same sentence..................... ...couldn't have said it better myself.