Resident Evil: Afterlife [Guest Writer] (3 Stars)

 

 In a world ravaged by a virus infection, turning its victims into the Undead, Alice (Jovovich), continues on her journey to find survivors and lead them to safety. Her deadly battle with the Umbrella Corporation reaches new heights, but Alice gets some unexpected help from an old friend. A new lead that promises a safe haven from the Undead takes them to Los Angeles, but when they arrive the city is overrun by thousands of Undead - and Alice and her comrades are about to step into a deadly trap.

I'm a big fan of the Resident Evil movies mainly because I enjoy a good zombie and high tech slasher flick as much as the next bloodthirsty gal but this movie kind of gave me mixed feelings. I've probably seen this movie over 10 times and the first time that I did see it, I liked it although some of the parts dragged on for me but I guess they needed to have a bit of pacing and a break from all the shooting and killing. Now I'm starting to wonder how long they can drag this story on and I'm praying that this doesn't try to compete with the Friday the 13th franchise. 

So first the story: Alice (Jovovich) has just infiltrated an umbrella corporation stronghold located in Asia and she's brought some friends along - herself (or at least her carbon copies but of course we all know that nothing can be better than the original) and she goes about systematically destroying labs and killing all the nasty evildoers to get to the head-honcho. Suddenly when she's about to take her revenge and end it all she's injected with the anti-virus that puts her back to square one, the big evil boss has gone into hiding and she's now running around like a chicken with her head cut off trying to find Clair (watch the previous film) and all her buddies from the last film up in Alaska where there is supposedly no disease. Come to find that Clair's mind has been wiped and so she trusses her up like a Thanksgiving turkey and they continue on their journey to figure out what's happened to Clair and the others. 

Okay so this is just a quick synopsis and I wanted to give you a story that was less vague than the official plot version. Of course she meets some survivors (what would the movie be without some zombie cannon fodder) and some new twists and turns in the plot emerge but nothing too earth-shattering as to be completely unexpected. I'm starting to see a pattern here and if I'm not mistaken it's starting to resemble a video game more than a movie as we continue on with each flick and from what I've seen they have even gotten some of their inspiration from the RE games. Now this would be all fine and dandy except some of the characters that show up in the film (while explained in the game) has absolutely no history in the movie and makes no sense. A good example would be the huge-ass hulking zombie giant with a metal axe the size of an oak tree and a potato sack nailed to his head. We see that he has some slighter than average intelligence because he uses an axe (haven't seen any other zombie using tools) but other than that we know nothing about this guy. Of course Alice has a huge showdown as you have probably seen in the trailer but come on people! Apparently this guy is supposed to the a "boss" in the video game and while I don't know the history I've read that apparently they have a little bit of knowledge on him in the game, information that isn't even disclosed to the viewers of the movie. Seriously? This plot is starting to have more holes in it than swiss cheese and I've pretty much stopped taking it seriously. Good action? You bet. Good acting? Nothing I can complain about too much. Good plot? This is debatable and I've started to just look at these films as throw-away horror slash action pieces. 

In the beginning this movie had some great promise and with the new powers that Alice acquired it added a new dimension to the heroine character that I wanted to see more of, but now they are just getting repetitive and I'm waiting for something new and more realistic (as realistic as flesh eating zombies created by a evil corporation can get). While I know Alice does some great action scenes and many go to see her in her tight outfits cut out into jig-saw puzzles kicking some major ass, a good solid plot isn't a huge request either although I know it may be difficult with something that is being dragged out over 3 or 4 movies. Overall it was an okay movie for what it has become today. Don't watch it for the plot, but the action.