apocalypse sow.

With the Resident Evil 2 Remake released to critical acclaim - well my mate Paul was excited* - across PS4, Xbox One and PC in January 2019 and Resident Evil 8 coming soon(ish) I reckoned it'd be a good time to re-review some of the top quality motion pictures based on that illustrious video game saga.

Plus they've got viruses and stuff in them so they kinda suit the mood.

Have to admit tho' I did pull this one randomly from the boxset (it was a gift honest) so no idea which one this is but I think it's the second - slightly less shitey one.



Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004)
Dir: Alexander Witt
Cast: Milla Jovovich, Sienna Guillory, Oded Fehr, Iain Glenn, Sandrine Holt, Thomas Kretschmann, Sophie Vavasseur, Razaaq Adoti, Jared Harris, and Mike Epps.

L.J.: [a Zombie walks in front of his car] GTA, Motherfucker!
[he runs over the Zombie, which flips over his car]
L.J.: Yeah! Ten points!

Welcome to Raccoon City, a normal American suburban paradise indistinguishable from any other but for the large amounts of piss stained tramps wandering about trying to bite folk.

Oh yes, and the fact that it looks a wee bit like Canada and also that the bird from The Fifth Element has taken to wandering about the streets wearing a tea-towel as a dress.

So actually nothing like a normal American suburban paradise then?

Well apart from the tramps obviously.

Anyway, while the stinky hobo's are quickly taking over and the towns residents (who surprisingly aren't evil) are desperately trying to leave - or at the very least are desperate to appear in a better film - the local law enforcement (and part time jazz dance crew by the looks of them) are fighting a losing battle to maintain order - and interest - against an overwhelming number of undead gypsies and the directors almost obscene obsession with crash zooming in on ladies underwear as they climb stairs to avoid a nibbling.

If this wasn't enough to put a downer on everyone's week, the evil multinational in charge of the town, the Umbrella corporation has decided to erect large gates at every exit and has taken to machine gunning anyone who gets too close.

Which is a mercy killing really.

Valentine: She loves you not.

The local (and I do mean local) news anchor Terri Morales (turnip nosed, topless star of Rapa Nui and latter day Mr Robot cast member Holt) is bravely (and sweatily) reporting from the front lines.

What she doesn't realize is that Umbrella are blocking the broadcast, effectively cutting Raccoon City off from the outside world.

The swines.

You see, it seems that not only do they own the local secret labs, the pound shop and the bakery but also the news channels too.

Imagine an even more patently bastard Trump empire but with sexier suits and less grating accents.

Oh yes and an ability to say 'China' properly.

Tho' you think she'd have noticed the big, fuck off Umbrella logo on the side of the cameras before now.

Back in town at the local police station, a squad of Raccoon Cities finest are doing their best not to get bitten by stinky zombie prostitutes whilst not spilling their coffees and filing traffic reports but to no avail.

Enter (oh go on, if I must) barely dressed, gun toting tottie Jill Valentine (Guillory from Love Actually and Fortitude), a no nonsense cop, kicked off the force for doing things her way.

Is there any cliche this film wont dig up and parade kicking and screaming in front of us like so gin soaked arthritic relative?

Taking time out from telling everyone to leave whilst walking around with her arse wiggling in the style of a ten year old cross-dressing Chinese boy, Jill shoots an undead hooker in the face and grabs a Snickers bar before heading off to meet up with her better looking (and far better dressed) cop buddy Carlos (the chip pan haired Fehr from, ahem, The Mummy Returns).

Which begs the question as to why she didn't just go and meet up with him in the first place rather than going to the station just to walk straight thru' and leave.

Oh yes, it was so we could all enjoy the long tracking shot of her backside.

My bloody Valentine.

Anyway some more (inconsequential but very loud) shit happens and the pair end up hiding out in a church alongside Terri the reporter and rent an ethnic sidekick Wells (Adoti from Doom - the guy must like his video games, well it's either that or he's got a huge drugs habit to fund) where our fearsome foursome come across a fat vicar and his zombie sister before being attacked by some inconsequential CGI turd-monsters with big tongues.

Slobbering slimy mouth monsters and skimpily dressed heroines?

This is where the movie could get interesting.

But no, given the choice between some girl on monster tentacle sex or having the writers wife smash thru' the window on a motorbike the director goes for the latter.

Yup, it's genetically engineered skinny bird Alice (the monkey faced, boy hipped and high Scrabble scoring Jovovich), fresh from lying strapped to a bed and flashing her smooth milky white thighs and a wee bit of bush (just enough to give the small boys watching something to do with their free hand) at the end of the first movie and ready to kick zombie bum.

Oh, and show her pants a lot.

Jovovich: Water sports.

Meanwhile back at the plot, the evil (yet sexily uniformed) Major Jeff Cain (Kretschmann, that nasty rapist from The Stendhal Syndrome) is busy arguing with the crippled (both physically - I mean he is ginger - and emotionally) genius behind Umbrella's slightly dodgy bio-weapons experiments Dr. Ashford (Harris, who is obviously getting ready to appear in Chernobyl - the miniseries not the actual place that is).

It seems that in the confusion they forgot to evacuate the good doctor's daughter before shutting down the city, mistakenly crashing the car she was in into a wall instead.

Arse.

Well Milla knew exactly who to fuck to get into the picture but who does she have to fuck to get out of it?

Wheeling off in a strop (well in a wheelchair but you know what I mean), Ashford (but alas not Simpson) secretly contacts our merry band of zombie hunters - who've now picked up a wise cracking pimp named LJ ('played' if that's the right word by a shameless Epps) and offers them a safe route out of the city.

But only if they rescue his daughter first....

Seriously, this doesn't deserve art this good.

Jumping the directors ship for the abominable sequel to the lackluster (nah, I'm being polite - that should read utterly shite) Resident Evil, baby faced movie mangler Paul W.S. Anderson handed over the reigns to Alexander Witt.

Lucky fella.

As you may remember, Anderson is the 'genius' behind the brash and ballsy violent violation of Forbidden Planet that was Event Horizon, the fist fuck of a film called Alien Vs. Predator as well as the not too bad (if I'm honest) Mortal Kombat and the Kurt Russell straight to video Blade Runner-baiting abortion Soldier.**

Sorry if I'm bringing back bad memories here but people need reminding of these facts.

"Laugh now!"

So you can only imagine how much of an utter shite-fest this movie is seeing as Anderson quickly booted Witt from the director's chair for the next installment.

Tho' let's be honest, how do you make a totally unwanted and unnecessary sequel to a film that couldn't even be arsed being anything like the video game it was based on in any way halfway decent or indeed watchable?

Give credit where it's due tho', I mean Witt's DP CV is/was certainly impressive (in a mainstream kinda way) and for years previous to this travesty he'd been working alongside Sir Ridley of Scott which you'd think would be pretty good on the job training.

At the very least the film should look nice, not like it was shot thru' a gauze of watered down shite.

Saying that it was 16 years and about 400 sequals ago so some fucker must have liked it.

Which is even scarier a thought when you realise that the next one - the beige hell that was Resident Evil: Extinction - was directed by the uber-permed one-hit wonder Russell (Razorback) Mulcahy.
For those lucky enough to never have seen it, it's less a horror thrill-ride and more a virtual reality trip thru' Simon LeBon's 80s boil wash.

On a brighter note, Alexander Witt's career now seems to consist of making short films for Land Rover which must pay quite well seeing as his last major movie - the Nic Cage starer Red Squad - seems to have vanished into the ether.

Imagine that, a Nic Cage movie too shit to release?

Now if only RE:A was as scary.

"You ain't seen me....right?"

Who stole Milla's leg?

Complete and utter tosh, which has scarily given me a real urge to revisit the rest now.

Is there any hope for me?


















































*So excited in fact that he did a 'mod' of main character Claire Redfield so you can play the entire game with her just wearing her underwear.

Look:

**Scary but true - Soldier which was written by David Peoples, who co-wrote the script for Blade Runner is considered to be an unofficial sequel/prequel to it,

Not only does the film subtlety reference the stories of Philip K. Dick but it also features a Spinner from Blade Runner amongst the background wreckage on the planet.

And if that wasn't enough, Kurt Russell’s character is shown to have fought in the battles referenced in Roy Batty’s (Rutger Hauer) famous monologue - the Shoulder of Orion and Tannhäuser Gate - leading to some film fans to assume that they are, in fact, one in the same character.