Underground Zombies Unite

Rating: 6/10 (15 October 2016)

"Mortal Combat" director Paul W.S. Anderson's first entry in the "Resident Evil" franchise is basically a low-budget zombie munch-fest based on the popular Capcom video game that spawned the series. This $ 30-million horror chiller relies on several narrative devices to fuel its adrenalin-laced antics. First, the heroine suffers from amnesia as she struggles to remember what she was doing in the ultra-secret, high-tech, subterranean laboratory of the Umbrella Corporation where scientists have been conducting research and development on experimental viruses for military usage. Second, from the moment that the rescue team arrives and collects Alice (Milla Jovovich of "The Fifth Element"), Matt (Eric Mabius of "Cruel Intentions"), and Spence (James Purefoy of "Solomon Kane"), they have an hour to penetrate the Hive, carry out their mission, and exit the complex before it seals itself shut. Third, the entire experience occurs in a claustrophobic setting that accentuates the suspense after our heroes encounter a zombie horde. Everybody earning a paycheck in the Hive dies when a traitor smashes a lethal t-virus container that shuts down the facility and winds up spreading death. Fourth, the ravenous undead are not the only adversaries that our heroes must contend with; zombie Dobermanns threaten them as well as a mysteriously mutated monster with a long, elastic tongue and razor-sharp claws that can penetrate a train. Believe it or not, Anderson displays some discretion in some of the greatest gut-churning scenes. When a group is trapped inside an elevator, one woman squeezes her head through an opening and realizes too late as do her companions that she is going to be decapitated when the elevator goes upward and smashes her head. The audience, especially those that have played the Capcom game, know that you have to put a bullet in a zombie's head to kill it. Unfortunately, our stalwart heroes aren't privy to this life-saving information. Eventually, the supercomputer that regulates the Hive and takes the holographic form of an adolescent female becomes another of our heroes' adversaries.
As the plot unfolds, Alice regains her memory in bits and pieces and realizes that she was the individual who had decided to expose the Umbrella Corporation. All of the laboratory technicians in the Hive perish tragically through no fault of their own because one mysterious individual sabotaged the Hive. These employees come back to life as zombies that live only to eat. These zombies are traditional "Night of the Living Dead" shambling walkers. The close quarters inside the Hive as well as the booby-traps that our heroes must navigate to avoid constitutes a primary form of suspense. At one point, our desperate heroes clamber atop the air condition ducts dangling by wires from the ceiling to escape the zombies milling about beneath them. One of the more memorable scenes takes place before this one when the rescue team arrives in a hallway that has been booby-trapped with the equivalent of a cheese grater made up of lasers to slice up the rescue team as they scramble to avoid them. Our heroine Alice—dressed in a skimpy red dress—contends with hunger Dobermanns in one of the strongest scenes in the film. Just when she thinks that she had taken care of these menacing dogs, she runs into others. Before long, even these canines mutilate undead dogs and attack Milia, but she knows how to contend with them.
"Resident Evil" gets the franchise off to a fitting start when our hero arrives by train.