Possibly the best in the series

Rating: 5/10 (27 November 2010)

I haven't really changed my mind about this film franchise since I reviewed the last one of the bunch (or the ones before, really), but I've probably reached a point where I don't care that much any more and just hope for some good entertainment. Just to summarize where I'm at: big fan of the games, hugely disappointed by the lack of Resident Evil in the actual films.
Frankly speaking, I had a good feeling ever since I saw the trailer. There were quite a few familiar scenes, so I hoped for something tangible from the RE universe to keep me going. Ironically, it's not really the RE characters that make this film feel a bit more related to the games, it's a couple of friendly faces of the "evil" undead. Excuse me, infected.
The story (?) moves on from where it left off and while I couldn't really remember where that was, it seems it had something to do with Alice and her clones and finding the oh-so-clichéd "safe haven" in an apocalypse scenario. And really, not much else happens, except a bit of ping-pong between havens, while encountering the odd character that we had seen before in the previous films and some others who are mostly only meat to eat.
What surprised me in a positive way was that, had the producers taken a little more time to tie the action together, confer a tiny little bit more depth to the guys and gals on screen, Resident Evil: Afterlife could've counted for a very respectable flick. The way it came out, it just has this feeling of unfulfillment about it that I couldn't shake off.
Even so, it gets a passing grade. As mentioned above, the saving grace is two prolonged scenes - Axeman and Wesker fight. While I did keep wondering where one would get an Axeman strolling around Los Angeles, I loved how similar it felt to the game. Also, the shotgun with coins was a nice touch. It was such a fun scene that even the excessive slow motion (and there is a lot of that throughout the film) didn't ruin it. And then, the Wesker scene, where Shawn Roberts took all the effort to make Wesker move and act so like the character in the games that it made my heart skip a beat. Both, very well executed set pieces- as was the intro, actually.
To balance that, we had the underwhelming inclusion of Chris Redfield (Wentworth Miller) and the ignorable presence of Claire (Ali Larter). Even some of the side characters had more of an impact than these two. But you can't always get what you want, I guess.
The positive surprise was complete in that the 3D didn't irritate me the way it usually does. Actually, having seen both versions of the film, it had a more authentic feel than the 2D version. I can't actually complain about how Anderson shot the film, it's just that his way of making things come together is rather superficial. In the end, these films will never really be what the Resident Evil games are, so we have to remember rule #32 and enjoy the little things.