Okay, so I'm in DC, at the beautiful MPAA theater to screen RE: APOCALYPSE for my local paper at a freakishly early 10:30 AM screening, and the woman in charge informs me that, surprise, Screen Gems isn't allowing any advance print reviews for the film. As she explains to me the situation (which I get: it's a Paul Anderson trademark to never screen movies for critics), the movie begins rolling, so I have no choice but to save any potential vitriol for the internet.
And there is lots.
Well, let's put it this way: if you liked the first one, you'll like the second one. Me, I'd prefer to stick my head into a bowl of Roseanne's stomach fat, but different strokes, different folks, right? APOCALYPSE is stupid with a capital STOOOOOO. Alexander Witt is essentially Paul WS Anderson 2: The Reckoning, and he likes to keep things moving at a quick, incoherent pace, splicing the worst elements of both the horror and action genres.
And no, I've never played the games. If you think that I shouldn't be reviewing the movie because of that, congratulatons. Go fist yourself.
The movie takes off from the end of the first one. Apparently the Umbrella Corporation is ready to nuke Raccoon City to remove themselves from the whole "zombie" incident. Alice, androgynously beautiful Milla, must get out of the city, with a little help from her friends.
Jill Valentine is played by Sienna Gulliroy, and she's also hot, but really more sexy than anything else. You know what I'm talking about, yes, she's pretty, but she's more hot as hell sexy than anything else. She has nothing to do, of course, and when she gives up the spotlight to Alice halfway through the movie, she never gets to recover it. And I suppose fidelity to the games is key, but the halter top and hotpants during the zombie apocalypse? I love her intro too: As we see a number of newspaper clippings reporting that she's been dropped from her covert agency (um, covert enough to get newpaper coverage?), a pair of long legs wearing sexy high heels strides into the picture. So, in other words, while Milla was fighintg those zombies, Jill Valentine was clubbing?
There are a few others. Oded Fehr is Carlos, a tough guy with a heart of gold who is apparently flirting with Alice in some scenes...? He doesn't have anything to do either, but the guy looks good in black. There's also good old Mike Epps, from the FRIDAY movies... good lord, if I never have to see Mike Epps in a movie again, I will consider my life to be a happy one.
The zombies are more plentiful in this movie than in the first one, which is a good thing. Being that they are out in the open, it also increases the fright quotient a bit, although not to the point of being actually scary. Still, the movie keeps to zombie logic solidly, and the walking dead are always fun to see on the screen if done right. Unfortunately, often the view of the zombies are obscured, as if Witt is aiming for a PG-13 rating (most likely), and they are often seen in disorienting slow motion. The gore level is surprisingly low for an R movie, but that's because this is a movie with more kicking than biting.
I don't know how the Nemesis comes across in the games, but in the movie, he's a charmingly stupid creation. Umbrella needs someone to go into the city and track down a few survivors who could be ANYWHERE, so they bring in this slow, lumbering creature carrying a rocket launcher. Imagine the biggest, stupidest looking grunt (Bane spliced with monster genes) and give him a rocket launcher, and you've got your Nemesis. I half expected him to belt out a, "KOMPRESSOR DOES NOT DANCE!"
Anderson's hand prints are all over the movie. The ridiculous set pieces, the sections of plotless film, the poorly written but plentiful minorities, all the Anderson trademarks are present. He even squeezes in an improbable MORTAL KOMBAT reference during a sad, sorry excuse for a fight scene (with an audience) that brings the plot to a total halt. Most troubling is when the crew finds a case in which the virus' antidote is kept. What's the case? Why, a Transformers lunch box! The mind commits suicide at the possibilities.
So there ya go. RE; APOCALYPSE is a forgettable sequel, complete with an interminable epilogue that establishes a potential third entry in the series, dangling it as some sort of bait. I didn't bite, and I advise you don't either.
] and the Lickers, which we already saw in the first films. I hope that the director of this isn't "PWSA lite" or anything.
