Resident Evil

When I was in undergrad circa 1997, myself and my roommate were hooked on Resident Evil on Playstation.  We'd play for hours and hours while groups of other guys in the house would ebb and flow in the room to spectate the game.

Then the movies came out.

Jill Valentine - COMINAYAY - HAAAAH!

First one came out in 2002 while I was at Cornell.  Went to see it myself.  The only true horror film of the bunch, this movie completely creeped me out.  Milla Jovavich played Alice, the main character.  But the movie also had some great actors like Eric Mabius (third Crow movie) and Michelle Rodriguez.  A great flick that left me dying for part 2.

The second installment, Resident Evil: Apocalypse came out and turned the series into action films.  Better yet, it introduced my favorite character, Jill Valentine played by Sienna Guillory, and her famous line "try to shoot 'em in the head."  Lovin' me some Jill Valentine from the game and the introduction of her character in short black hair was CA-LUTCH!  Apocalypse also introduced Carlos Olivera played by Oded Fehr, who played Antoine the Man-Whore in Deuce Bigolo.  Another great addition.  The big battle (they all have one) was between Alice and Apocalypse, a morphed form of Eric Mabius' character.  Sucked to see a character I liked turned into a beast, but his human side came through and he ultimately committed a kind act.  Nice touch.

Third movie, Resident Evil: Extinction was probably my least favorite.  Not as cool from an action standpoint as Apocalypse, certainly not as horrifying as the initial installment, and the direction was getting more weird.  An early and not-quite fitting movement into higher science fiction.  We start to see some clairvoyance and such that I didn't dig and found a hive full of Alice clones. Didn't make sense to me and I wasn't loving it.  The big battle between Alice and Tyrant was pretty cool, though.

SOOOOOOO........  Resident Evil: Afterlife in 3-D comes out in 2010.  The trailers for it look like they have taken the series into total ridiculum.  Crazy karate shit, no horror, and it's looking to take a turn in the Aeon Flux / Sucker Punch line.  Not my thing.  And in 3-D?  Gettin' silly here.

As it turns out, Afterlife ROKKED.  The 3-D was great, the story got waaaay complex.  The movie was confusing and made total sense all at the same time.  They combined some great new characters, vilified Jill Valentine (which didn't make me happy),  and turned Wesker into the ultimate bad guy.  Waaaaay to complicated for me to try to tell here, this movie was awesome, awesome, awesome.

Now to the new one that just came out.  Myself and Renegade Rip went to see Resident Evil: Retribution in big screen 3-D.  New theater, new movie, so happy.  Once again - awesome and waaaay to complicated for me to tell the story.

More Jill Valentine

Evil Jill - not as cool

A few things about this franchise that I can tell you.  As with one of my other favorite string of flicks, Final Destination, they set a few ground rules for the franchise and don't deviate.  Here are the rules for Resident Evil films:

1.  The films start with action - do NOT walk into the theater 5 minutes late.

2.  They will reintroduce characters on you - they are never gone.

3.  They will not kill off characters from the game.  Claire, Jill, Chris, Wesker, Leon - they ain't going nowhere.

4.  There will always be a big battle with a big beast - and Alice will win.

5.  You are ALWAYS left with a feeling of helplessness.  When you think all is good, the end always pans back and shows a worse situation than the characters just survived.

6.  Jill Valentine is hot

Get the series on disk quick.  Watch from 1-4.  Get to a great heater asap before Retribution leaves the theaters.  If you need someone to watch it with, gimme a call.  Cheers!