Movie Review: Resident Evil: Afterlife

Alice, played by Milla Jovovich, is still on her quest to find and save the few bands of survivors from a world ravaged by a virus infection developed by The Umbrella Corporation headquartered in Tokyo. This is the fourth film in this series of at least five—because this one has a cliffhanger, temporary, disappointing ending. There will be no resolution of this chapter of the never-ending,depressing series about the end of the world and the rise of the flesh eating Zombie nightmares.

While the first three movies of this series were interesting enough viewed on television, this IMAX 3D promised to be more dramatic. Wrong! This segment really seemed like a weekly installment of so-so SyFy television. It was nowhere as interesting as the first three movies that preceded it.

The directing, acting and special effects were good enough, but the story wandered. In fact it wandered all over the planet starting in Tokyo and ending in the City of Angels, which seemed to need a new name to replace the ruined Hollywood Sign on the hillside overlooking the smoldering remains of L.A.—ZombieVille would be true to life, or true to death.

The extra cost of the IMAX 3D showings aren’t really worth the extra money except for maybe the most rabid “Resident Evil” fans. Ali Larter as Clair Redfield, Spencer Locke as K-Mart, Sienna Guillory as Jill Valentine and Kacey Barnfield as Crystal all add much eye candy to the cast. Boris Kodjoe as Luther West, Sergio Peris-Mencheta as Angel Ortiz, Wentworth Miller as Chris Redfield, Fulvio Cecere as Wendell and Norman Yeung as Kim Young make up most of the band of trapped humans that Alice attempted to rescue. Milla Jovovich also plays each member of her troop of Special Forces clones.

Shawn Roberts as Albert Wesker and Kim Coates as Bennett do a good job as the film’s very bad and corrupt villains. Bennett is a former Hollywood film producer. Slap, slap, take that Hollywood.

This R-Rated, 97-minute Zombie flick is both written and directed by Paul W. S. Anderson (Jovovich’s husband) and is based on the popular video game.

Ray Olubowale plays the mysterious and very scary, even for the undead, Axeman. He’s kind of the giant, unbeatable black knight of yore.

The film opens in Tokyo with Mika Nakashima playing J Pop Girl standing in the rain. The camera begins on her sexy, red, oh-so-fashionable high heels, pans up her striped stockings, short shirt, eventually reaching her rain soaked, pretty baby face. When a yummy looking likely victim passes her…he becomes her meal. Take that Japanese monster films.

Frankly, it would be nice if the next movie in the series were more like the first three. This one kind of followed many of the characters in it when they all leaped off the edge of a high building. And enough of these rusted, old freighters. This looks much like the same one used in “Waterworld” and many of the B horror flicks featuring old ghost ships haunting the Bermuda Triangle. So, so trite. Shape up, or ship out! We all expect more after the “Afterlife.”