Resident Evil: Afterlife 3D
The world as we know it has been destroyed by the infection and Alice now continues her quest for revenge against the Umbrella Corporation. After an unexpected setback, Alice winds up pursuing her friend Claire and the other survivors who sought refuge in Alaska where there was rumoured to be a safe haven without infection. Alice finds out this was a lie and is determined to seek out the truth.
I’ve been an avid fan of the RE games since the first one helped launch the original Playstation and had an absolute blast with RE 5 on the Playstation 3. I was overjoyed at the news of a RESIDENT EVIL film and though I did enjoy the first one I couldn’t help but wonder why they strayed so far from what the game truly was, ending up with something that was not a whole hell of a lot different from your average zombie flick. They did learn their lesson quick though and decided to be a bit more faithful with the second installment but the third really went off the beaten path. RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE is caught somewhere in the middle but still manages to be a decent action flick.
My biggest problem with this series is Alice. I love Milla don’t get me wrong but I don’t understand why Paul W.S. Anderson and the rest of the crew involved decided to create a new female lead and forsake the ones already there in front of them. Add to that, they spend so much time over the course of these films developing Alice and her arsenal of (sometimes cool, sometimes ridiculous) abilities when they should have been diving head long into the Umbrella Corporation, the T-Virus and the many other strains and developments that made the games so damn intriguing. Yes, they kept the gore and violence. Yes, the action looks great and these films get slicker and slicker as they go but where’s the depth and mystery? Where’s that extra push to make these films stand above the rest?
The rumor is this film was based loosely on RE 5 and therein sits one of the other problems. Each film tries to steal a bit of lore or add a familiar name but with Alice as the lead it ends up being a moot point. Jill Valentine, Claire and Chris Redfield, even my main man Wesker are all here but what’s the use as they’re underdeveloped fillers most of the time. Claire was useless in the third film and remains useless here. I loved seeing Wentworth Miller come aboard as Chris Redfield but other than a wink in PRISON BREAK’s direction and a couple one liners he too becomes a fleeting memory. Albert Wesker is a big deal when it comes to the games, he was at ground zero and is a wavering presence over your shoulder at all times. The battles with him are cool but to non-fans of the game he might come off as more of a Neo clone than anything else which is a shame because he’s a superb villain.
RESIDENT EVIL: AFTERLIFE was a fun time at the movies and an absolute feast for the eyes in 3-D (the rain drops cascading off the actor names in the opening credits was a nice touch). The pace slowed down a couple times but the action was bang on when it was there. The undead did take a backseat to Wesker and the Axeman (who looked amazing by the way) but they still managed to squeeze in the new mutated dogs and zombies (with tentacles) from RE 5 which though brief was still good to see. I liked the ending (also a cool RE 5-ish tie in) but I thought they were planning on rebooting the franchise after this one and not moving forward, an idea I absolutely loathe I might add. Who knows with Hollywood these days but I’d personally love to see Leon Kennedy take the lead in a live action film and personally would have liked Wentworth Miller in that role instead of the one he ended up with.
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