When
I spent my fifteen bucks—one for me, one for my girlfriend—I knew I was getting
my money’s worth in one way or another; most likely it would be a laugh riot
and hence I’d consider the film the best comedy of the year . . . or I could be
pleasantly impressed that Paul W.S. Anderson (Resident Evil, Alien Vs. Predator) got some things right. Well, it’s
the former; no surprise there. But it’s also the funniest movie of the year by
far.
It’s
safe to say, however, that the Resident
Evil franchise has stepped into the Schumacher era of its overlong lifespan.
Alice may not be sporting rubber nipples on her suit, but the entire film had
its own metaphysical rubber nipples popping out left and right. The first rubber
nipple is during the intro in which Milla Jovovich speaks to the camera and
explains all the events from the previous films (at least in Apocalypse that made sense, because
toward the end of the film we saw that she talked to a camcorder); then the
film essentially starts straight to the Dawn of the Dead rip-off, which Alice
wakes up in a suburban house with a mute daughter (that speaks just fine) and
husband Carlos Olivera (what?!) and
then Carlos gets bit, oh no, and it’s so blatantly obvious that the film is
copying Dawn that I expected to see
Ving Rhames dressed as a cop and say the same exact lines he said to Sarah
Polley; then, what these not-quite-literal rubber nipples made me giggle the
most was all the copy and pasted elements from the video game franchise that
has no rhyme or reason to even be in the film. For instance, the zombies now
have mouths like the majini from Resident
Evil 5—you know, the mouths which CAPCOM clearly took from Guillermo del
Toro’s Blade 2 and made them not as
scary; yeah, those mouths—and in Retribution,
I finally thought that Anderson actually was about to make sense of something
every fan of the video game franchise was confused about. The Red Queen told us—yes,
literally, she talks to the camera too (Alice isn’t the only one)—that she was
initiating the Las Plagas Undead. In my mind, I thought, Yes, finally he’s explaining why the zombies have become fast with
majini-mouths. But, really . . . it was his excuse to have zombies with guns
and chainsaws (but why wield a chainsaw if you can use a gun?), that could ride
motorcycles and shoot guns at the same time—if that’s a spoiler, it’s a spoiler
best known upfront. This isn’t scary; this is outrageously funny. What also
doesn’t make sense is the fact that the Umbrella Corporation currently
manufactures the Executioners from Resident
Evil 5 and meticulously hammers in each nail in their heads and shoulders
just for theatrics—if it didn’t make sense in RE5, it’s definitely going to be a laugh riot in Retribution. Which it was. But even
funnier yet, while Alice was fighting Jill, and Luther (didn’t he die in Afterlife? I swear he did) and Leon were fighting
the evil Las Plagas-infected Rain (I was expecting her to become a giant sea
monster like Irving in RE5), I
thought to myself, Paul might make
terrible Resident Evil films, but he
might make a good Mortal Kombat film
. . . then I realized he already did . . . and it was terrible.
What
Paul W.S. Anderson doesn’t seem to understand is that copying moments and
characters from the games and pasting them into the films isn’t working. Fan
boys are going to pick out the illogical inclusion of the characters, like I am
right now; and people who aren’t fans of the games aren’t going to care if Leon
is in the film or not. At this point, however, I think Paul W.S. Anderson knows
how terrible the films are, and he’s taking advantage of it—bringing characters
back to life just for giggles, having hilariously cheesy dialogue every chance
available, and not really giving a crap how terrible the actors are acting (the
actor who plays Leon, for instance, just talks louder when he is supposed to be
angry)—also, Sienna Guillory—who plays Jill—was by far the weakest in the film
even though she did fairly well as Jill Valentine in Apocalypse.
I
will say, however, that Resident Evil:
Retribution had some interesting science fiction themes. That’s where Paul
W.S. Anderson excels the most at: abstract, absurd ideas—like an underground
laboratory—that somehow just works. In fact, it’s a great idea. I will go even
further to say that Resident Evil:
Retribution is a great science fiction zombie thriller, but it’s the Resident Evil game elements which makes
it a funny, funny farce and—as stated earlier—the best comedy of the year. It’s
too late now. The franchise is now five down . . . but how many more can Paul
W.S. Anderson and his wife Milla Jovovich go on?
Which
brings me to the Schumacher effect; there gets to a point in every franchise
that starts becoming a joke—whether films or video games (even music; Linkin Park,
for instance—although they deliberately rebooted their sound to survive the Nu
Metal extinction)—in which a reboot is necessary. Pierce Brosnan’s 007 became
too absurdly science fiction, enter Daniel Craig as the realistic bond (and
then there was Quantum of Solace,
which was going back into bad habits); Kilmer’s and Clooney’s Batman films
became gaudy and flamboyantly gothic with ridiculous set pieces and actors
casted based on their popularity (Jim Carrey and Arnold Schwarzenegger), enter the Christopher Nolan reboot; and in video
games, Fallout 3 and Turok to name a couple (although, when
you reboot a dying franchise that has previously made good money, you must make
it fantastic—like Fallout 3, as
opposed to Turok, which was average
and therefore the franchise isn’t really being considered for another reboot or
sequel). And now we’re getting to a point in the Resident Evil film franchise in which the rubber nipples are exposed—the
fan boys only watch the films to laugh; the unbiased viewers might come out
thinking it was entertaining, but over the top, and none of the monsters made any sense (and they wouldn’t
be alone—the B.O.W.’s didn’t make any
sense to me either); the actors are lazy; the plot is confusing when it’s vague
and absurd when it’s clear; and worse of all, the director doesn’t care about
the source material anymore.
I
think that Hollywood might pull out the Nolan card pretty soon, because Resident Evil does have very important
contemporary themes. Biological warfare seems more realistic than nuclear in
this day and age, but Paul and friends seem to be stuck on the zombies and the
theatrics of the game franchise, rather than the scientific aspects, the
concepts, the survival horror, and the atmospheric tension. What makes the Resident Evil video game franchise so endearing
are the story and the characters (which is why Resident Evil 5 was the worst—the lack of survival horror put aside—because
that’s when the game franchise stopped caring about story and characters; but I
blame the directors and producer of RE5 rather
than CAPCOM as a whole), but Paul W.S. Anderson focuses on plot (which isn’t
the same as story) and dresses up actors
like characters from the game franchise and names them that character from the
game franchise and prays that the fans don’t realize they’re nothing like the
character from the franchise. I give credit to the Harry Potter film series for at least attempting to stay true to
the story of the books; while still they’re nowhere near as good as the books
because filmmakers tend to care more about plot than they do story—which is a
wide spreading disease in the illiterate world of Hollywood—it’s still an
honorable attempt, unlike with the Resident
Evil franchise. Seriously, the Resident
Evil from games 1-4 have as good of a story as Harry Potter, so why did Paul W.S. Anderson butcher it?
Oh
yeah, I know why: after the first film Milla Jovovich had his baby, so that
meant that Alice had to reoccur in RE2, 3, 4, and 5, and hence altering the good storyline from games, and keeping
his wife happy and making money. But, that’s fine. I’m glad Anderson burned the
franchise to the ground, because I’d really like to see Guillermo del Toro (Hellboy) or Neill Blomkamp (District 9) try to helm a reboot.
Because, let’s face it, Resident Evil will
always be a money maker . . . but they need to know when to quit, otherwise a
reboot will be impossible. I initially didn’t want to watch Batman Begins because I was left with
the sour taste of Batman & Robin
in my mouth (YUCK!), but finally someone said, “It’s a crime thriller ninja
movie,” and I was like “Heck yeah, I’ll watch it”—and it was great. But if
Schumacher made one more Batman film, I don’t know if Nolan could have salvaged
the series. Which leaves me at the end of my review . . . will Anderson know
when to quit for the greater good of mankind?
I give this film a 2/5.
