So stale it crumbles

Rating: 3/10 (13 September 2004)

You know that moment in every action or horror movie when the baddie is just about to kill, maim, bite, or otherwise put the hurt on a sympathetic character, when another, unseen sympathetic character shoots/stabs/whatevers the baddie in JUST the nick of time? "Resident Evil: Apocalypse" is an entire film based around just repeating that moment again and again and again. Each time, the director (who's somehow less famous and reputable than Paul W.S. Anderson, if that's conceivable) honestly seems to expect us to react to it, which borders on insulting. While it's not the worst movie of the year ("Day After Tomorrow" and "AvP" have it beat, while "Chronicles of Riddick" has it just about even), it's easily the most repetitive, predictable and stale--pretty much every shot or sequence you see is blatantly ripped off from some other movie.
If there is a redeeming quality to this movie, it's the nice assortment of surprisingly subtle visual references to the classic "Resident Evil 2" video game, on which it is loosely based. Unfortunately, the movie seems to have abandoned that great game's penchant for eerie atmospheric thrills in favor of constant, ridiculous action. Making an action movie out of "Resident Evil 2," a game firmly routed in the cinematic traditions of horror, is akin to making a horror movie out of "Virtua Fighter"--it's just the wrong idea.
Though they may draw similar audiences, horror and action actually aren't all that compatible, and nothing drives that point home like sitting through this movie. It sacrifices scares for explosions, atmosphere for flashy edits, and human fear for superhuman kung fu heroics. The constant use of the aforementioned just-in-time device is an attempt to artificially inject some real fear and tension, but it fails because of its predictability.
I'd compare this to the first "Resident Evil" film if I could remember anything about it besides Milla's brief nudity. This film, thankfully, seems destined to fade from memory just as quickly--leaving only fleeting glimpse of Milla's goodies behind.