Really, really bad film!

Rating: 1/10 (5 March 2005)

There was a time, long, long ago when the Silver Screen was reserved for for classics, for art, for the Golden Age of Hollywood. Those days are long gone. But at least movies had that special time. Video Games will never be regarded in this way. No matter how realistic and frightening the Resident Evil games can be the world of gaming will never be able to shed the geeky image of friendless, degenerate nerds playing for 11-hours straight. There's no glamour or admiration to be had here. And with the worlds of movies and video games merging closer and closer together (whether we like it or not) we can only expect a Sonic the Hedgehog live action movie soon (and some studio exec will probably cast Ben Affleck in the title role). I may sound like I'm talking nonsense, but, when you think about it...not really. We've already had a Super Mario Bros. movie and Double Dragon and Mortal Kombat: Annihilation and Alone in the Dark.
The first Resident Evil movie was no classic that's for damn sure but it's still a far superior film to this drek. Resident Evil: Apocalypse is so wantonly awful it's almost on par with House of the Dead. No joke! These zombies are not scary! At all! Dawn of the Dead this ain't.
For an R-rated movie the violence is blurred and confusing, why even bother with the swearing if that is really all that is keeping it from being a PG-13? It's shot and cut with no skill whatsoever. The plot makes no sense at all and there are frequent gaps in logic that even the most ignorant viewer can point out. Like why do the long-dead people in the graveyard (conveniently buried underneath only a few centimetres of loose dirt) suddenly come back to life when the T-virus is only supposed to be transfered through blood infection? And that was only just one part of a 'plot' that was constant nonsense. And by the end it was so far removed from the (better) story of the video games that the 'Resident Evil' title is really no more than a way of selling nonsense to people who expect and deserve something else.
Don't get me started on the characters! All I can say about them is that they might as well have been polygons. I know I'm not being really original when I say this movie is like watching a bunch of cut-scenes from a video game but...it is. It is totally NOT worth your time or money. Do not even give in to curiosity.
The DVD is in 2.35:1 anamorphic widescreen and (my version had) Dolby EX/DTS ES 6.1 sound. Plus a bunch of extras I care not for.