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I glanced at the movie poster of an armed woman roaming a destroyed city wearing only a towel and I wondered, “How long can Milla Jovovich coast on her looks before she has to do some serious acting?”
After seeing Resident Evil: Apocalypse, the verdict is clear: indefinitely.
What a knockout Jovovich is (literally)! She’s so (seemingly) naturally beautiful—and she’s mesmerizing and infinitely more frightening than any of the monsters in the movie. Plus she’s so watchable, she could be biting off her toenails and spitting them out and I’d still be glued to the screen. Her character, Project Alice, even has an attitude to boot.
Of course, criticizing this movie is like sticking red-hot pokers through the bars of a playpen. You don’t necessarily see Resident Evil: Apocalypse for the plot, which seems to have been airlifted wholesale out of 28 Days Later and the Dawn of the Dead remake: scientific experiment goes wrong and turns a city into bloodthirsty zombies. In this case, it’s Raccoon City that’s ravaged by contaminated laboratory workers. Project Alice and a cast of infected and semi-infected characters must evade their zombified neighbors as well as sundry creatures enlisted in the military. The group’s multi-tasking skills are challenged further because they must escape the city before its corporate-directed nuclear termination (seems Big Business now has The Bomb).
Sounds like a video game, doesn’t it? Oh, yeah—that’s because the movie is based on one. So, due to lowered expectations inherent in this fact, criticizing the plot of this movie is pretty much a moot point.
Nor do you see Resident Evil for witty dialogue, as English is chewed to a fine paste by a cast of largely foreign actors. Ditto for storytelling. Despite homages to Psycho, The Others, and Aliens, it’s all shock value. As for character development, that’s also a no-go. You don’t see this movie for rounded characters that will live in your memory for time immemorial. The cliché roll-call includes The Fey British Villain, The Doomed Do-Good Scientist, The Little Girl Mature-Beyond-Her-Years, and, inevitably, The Jive Fool. Some characters, including Project Alice, hold the key to the zombie infection, but that doesn’t diminish their capacity as stereotypes.
No, you don’t see Resident Evil for the above elements. You watch it to see Jovovich combat zombies, a trio of vermilion trolls that crawl on the ceiling, and a rather unsightly bioweapon called Nemesis (Matthew G. Taylor), who happens to be her ex (it’s a complicated relationship). Our heroine performs all these tasks like a seasoned pro. Thanks to Jovovich, you don’t have to be a fan of the video game to enjoy the movie.
