As far as video game movies go, Resident Evil has never really been at the top of that list. We start off where Afterlife ended, with Alice and co under attack from a newly replenished force of Umbrella Corporation goons and what tries to be a stylish use of filming techniques coupled with a tedious ten minute flashback of the previous films. Captured by umbrella, Alice awakens in yet another science lab full of nasties but this time she finds replicas of time square, the Kremlin and segments of suburbia which have been used to test the virus on live subjects welcoming her on her escape. Led by the mysterious Ada Wong and a now friendly Wesker, Alice has to make her way through the submerged Umbrella base, fight fields of zombies, horrific Lickers and even face of against her brainwashed bestie in order to make it out alive. Elsewhere in the facility another group also led by Wesker attempts to find and rescue Alice, will any of them survive another dance with the evil, newly resurrected Red Queen?
Mila Jovovich is back as Alice as ever the captive, though this time around you have to commend her acting as she seems to be one of the brightest sparks of acting in the whole film, while she still has her bouts of looking blank. Alice is at least there behind the dazed looks and silly action sequences this time. Sienna Guillory also reprises her role as Jill Valentine, last seen by Alice as a friend when Racoon City went slightly loopy, though trying to take at least some elements of the film to the screen Jill is now brainwashed and fighting against Alice for no apparent reason. Bingbing Li seems to be one of the few cast members who even wants to be there, giving a solid and quite the provocative (at least in wardrobe) super slinky spy Ada Wong. Michelle Rodriguez has a humorous turn as a girly girl yet it's only there for a nod to the fact she's for once not good with a gun. Mentioning the manly men of the film, you'll find even less to praise while Boris Kodjoe gave a character portrayal actually a bit more interesting than cardboard in Afterlife, in Retribution you usually forget he's in it. Another heavily and awkwardly peculiar move into the games world we get Johann Urb as Leon S Kennedy and Kevin Durand as Barry Burton, while both live up to the game by costumes standard neither has a remote grip on the joypad. With both almost nothing like the characters from the virtual world, it makes Shawn Roberts portrayal of Albert Wesker almost bearable (or maybe that's because he actually gets some lines unlike them). The rest of the cast just fade into the background like the films plot.
Is Resident Evil Retribution a good film? No. Is Retribution a good Resident Evil film? Worryingly not. Even as far as gaming film standards go, this is a terrible delve into new extremely unexplored depths, there's a reason we don't explore them! Somehow each film manages to make even more insane set pieces and crazy sub-plots that make no sense at all and just get worse as each film goes by. Still, even then you could probably forgive Retribution, but no. The real problem for Retribution is the fact that it's boring. For a film which fixes on ridiculous action we only get 2 or 3 scenes of such insanity, the rest is Paul W.S Anderson trying to scrape together a plot from the shards of shattered obscurity he saved from the past few films in the tragically now 5-long film saga. Though the fact that people still seem to want it(want is a strong word) Resident Evil most likely disappear entirely from the film universe yet maybe we'll get some closure with a final film to bury the hatchet. I wouldn't recommend Retribution, it's not good, at All. Films which usually require no plot and fix sales through explosions usually have more to offer than this, the ticket price is far too much to watch your life flash by on another terrible delve into this quickly spiraling out of control film universe. Avoid.
3 / 10
FIN.
Mila Jovovich is back as Alice as ever the captive, though this time around you have to commend her acting as she seems to be one of the brightest sparks of acting in the whole film, while she still has her bouts of looking blank. Alice is at least there behind the dazed looks and silly action sequences this time. Sienna Guillory also reprises her role as Jill Valentine, last seen by Alice as a friend when Racoon City went slightly loopy, though trying to take at least some elements of the film to the screen Jill is now brainwashed and fighting against Alice for no apparent reason. Bingbing Li seems to be one of the few cast members who even wants to be there, giving a solid and quite the provocative (at least in wardrobe) super slinky spy Ada Wong. Michelle Rodriguez has a humorous turn as a girly girl yet it's only there for a nod to the fact she's for once not good with a gun. Mentioning the manly men of the film, you'll find even less to praise while Boris Kodjoe gave a character portrayal actually a bit more interesting than cardboard in Afterlife, in Retribution you usually forget he's in it. Another heavily and awkwardly peculiar move into the games world we get Johann Urb as Leon S Kennedy and Kevin Durand as Barry Burton, while both live up to the game by costumes standard neither has a remote grip on the joypad. With both almost nothing like the characters from the virtual world, it makes Shawn Roberts portrayal of Albert Wesker almost bearable (or maybe that's because he actually gets some lines unlike them). The rest of the cast just fade into the background like the films plot.
Is Resident Evil Retribution a good film? No. Is Retribution a good Resident Evil film? Worryingly not. Even as far as gaming film standards go, this is a terrible delve into new extremely unexplored depths, there's a reason we don't explore them! Somehow each film manages to make even more insane set pieces and crazy sub-plots that make no sense at all and just get worse as each film goes by. Still, even then you could probably forgive Retribution, but no. The real problem for Retribution is the fact that it's boring. For a film which fixes on ridiculous action we only get 2 or 3 scenes of such insanity, the rest is Paul W.S Anderson trying to scrape together a plot from the shards of shattered obscurity he saved from the past few films in the tragically now 5-long film saga. Though the fact that people still seem to want it(want is a strong word) Resident Evil most likely disappear entirely from the film universe yet maybe we'll get some closure with a final film to bury the hatchet. I wouldn't recommend Retribution, it's not good, at All. Films which usually require no plot and fix sales through explosions usually have more to offer than this, the ticket price is far too much to watch your life flash by on another terrible delve into this quickly spiraling out of control film universe. Avoid.
3 / 10
FIN.
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