Some film franchises seem to go on forever.
In the case of Resident Evil we’re now dealing with the fifth live action film starring Milla Jovovich, while there’s also been a couple of animated ones too.
And all of these are, of course, based on a computer game.
Madness really if you think about it ..
The first few films had some semblance of a storyline. It might not have been much of a storyline, but it was still there.
This time round, however, they’ve done their utmost to remove any semblance of a storyline and messed around with the characters so much that it’s more than a little confusing.
While other film franchises have managed to give themselves a pretty successful “reboot” by bringing back the original cast and characters in a manner that was plausible Resident Evil hasn’t even tried. No. They’ve opted for clones. When you want to bring back a character that died several sequels back you can always just have a clone (or more)
So what are you left with? (and you’ll have to excuse me for some spoilers below, but since I don’t think anyone should waste their money on a ticket for this film .. )
Well you’ve got Milla Jovovich wearing very little (what looks like a tea towel I guess .. ) in a rather pointless scene that seems to go on forever. Sitting in the cinema I was amazed at how small the piece of cloth was and how well they managed to not show us any actual flesh
Milla Jovovich stars in Screen Gems’ action horror RESIDENT EVIL: RETRIBUTION.
Then you’ve got a Li Bingbing as Ada Wong. She’s part of the video game mythology but is a new character for the movie incarnations. Of course Alice knows who she is..
Li Bing Bing is Ada Wong in Screen Gems’ action horror RESIDENT EVIL: RETRIBUTION.
And while we’re talking about attractive women with rather odd costume choices ..
Alice conveniently finds all her gear early on in the movie so she’s able to go around the place dressed like this for the rest of the movie:
Milla Jovovich stars in Screen Gems’ action horror RESIDENT EVIL RETRIBUTION.
Hot woman in tight leather? As a guy that kind of works for me .. kind of ..
So who else did they bring back?
Well there’s Michelle Rodriguez who comes back as not one, but two clones. One’s “good”, while the other is well .. “evil”
Rain (Michelle Rodriguez) opens fire outside Alice’s suburban Raccoon City home in Screen Gems’ action horror RESIDENT EVIL: RETRIBUTION.
And they’ve also got a couple of incarnations of Oded Fehr
Oded Fehr in Screen Gems’ action horror RESIDENT EVIL RETRIBUTION.
And another character from one of the previous films also makes an appearance – Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory)
Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory) opens fire on the deck of the Arcadia in Screen Gems’ action thriller RESIDENT EVIL: RETRIBUTION.
Now don’t get me wrong ..
If you’re happy to sit through 95 minutes of action with Milla and the others battling the living dead (who for some odd reason have now become a lot more sentient .. no explanation for that either) then you’ll probably enjoy this movie.
But if you’ve actually seen the other films in the franchise you’re going to come away from this one and wonder what on earth you just sat through.
Yes – the fight scenes are pretty good. Yes – Milla and the others look great and yes, the 3D effects are fun, but I would hope (and almost pray) that this film is the last in the franchise. Either that or they’re really going to have to work on having an actual storyline for the next outing (and yes they did leave it open for yet another sequel!)
On a more positive note – the soundtrack is pretty good 🙂
Related articles
- Resident Evil: Retribution: The fifth fails (thehindu.com)
- Resident Evil Retribution Think Global Kill Local Poster (movieposters.ie)
- Resident Evil Retribution and The Resident Evil Bluray Boxset (comingsoon.ie)
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