It’s worth positioning this film correctly from the very beginning. By genre, it is assumed to be horror. The game series also predisposes to this. And in the film you can even find disturbing moments. But this is not our usual horror movie. The modern viewer may have never even seen anything like this. My friends, this is hard to believe, but before us is the most typical representative of a now almost extinct genre, category “B” horror.
For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, here’s a brief description of the concept.
Film category “B” – low-budget commercial film. Initially, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, this was the name for films that were shown in cinemas as the second number during the then common double screenings. The first number at such film shows was a popular, big-budget film or “category A film”, followed by a film that was not very popular.
Over time, the term "B movie" has become a euphemism for low-budget film productions that lack artistic merit. At the same time, this category became a niche in which experiments of various kinds of independent filmmakers were possible.
Around the 80s, it was from this category that the horror franchises so beloved by the whole world emerged. Well, the slasher genre also has its roots here.
If you want to know my personal opinion, I would describe it like this:
The B-Movie Is a Genre Like Dinosaurs. It evolved for a long time, but in the end lost to more successful representatives. Nowadays, finding something new in this direction is as easy as going out to the store to buy bread and finding a severed unicorn head between a beer and cheese on the grocery shelf. The visionaries of our time are not able to walk the fine line between an idea and bad taste, so they constantly slide into trash and turkey meat.
And yes, a budget of a certain number of millions should seem to convince me, because low-budget is the main feature of “B” films, but the film pulled out a lucky ticket. After all, the plot of the entire Resident Evil series, especially the first parts, is the gaming equivalent of “B movies”.
So, treat relics with respect. And be prepared that horror will not scare you. It didn’t even frighten me, the last coward who could be driven into hysterics by a suddenly rustling package in the kitchen. But that was not the point.
Raccoon City and films with Jovovich
Well let’s face it. This film is really much closer to Resident Evil and Resident Evil 2 than anything Paul Anderson did with Milla Jovovich. The creators were not lying here.
True, the director of the previous version of the films at least tried to adhere to the appearance of the original characters, but in the new film Chris and, with a very big stretch, Claire look like himself. But they approached the general canon much more painstakingly. In some places.
But because of this, there are no surprises. Played a game? So you know the plot.
Canon is a relative concept
The adherence to the original story is both the film’s main problem and what saved the viewing for me. The film contains the plot of the first and second parts of the game and in some places they are conveyed perfectly. But then the creators begin to put theirs on top and you, sitting in a comfortable chair and trying to use at least half of your brain to think about what is happening, feel like a fan of the resident is writhing in your soul.
Let’s be more specific. Here I will tell you what happened in the films and make remarks about the games; if I make a mistake somewhere, don’t be afraid to point it out to me.
Games. In the original, Chris and Claire do not have any special backstory (as well as other characters who seem to have been born at the time of the Raccoon City Incident). All we know is that they are siblings, they grew up together, but then Chris went to the service and Claire went to college. However, from the fact that Claire went in search of her brother as soon as he stopped communicating and the fact that she has a lot of things “from her brother’s shoulder,” we can conclude that they communicate closely and are very attached to each other.
In the film. Chris and Claire, orphans raised in an orphanage/laboratory complex of Umbrella, under the wing of Dr. Birkin. Little Claire at the orphanage “became friends” with the monster Lisa, at the same time sniffing out what kind of wind was blowing from Umbrella. At the first opportunity, she left her brother to rot in the town she hated, and joyfully rode off into the sunset, disappearing from her brother’s life for five years. And only when it dawned on her what size ass was planned in Raccoon City, she deigned to ask how her brother was doing there and whether he bit good people in his spare time. Doesn’t bite. Chris, at this time, under the full protectorate of Doctor Birkin, whom he considers to be his father, joins the police in squad S.T.A.R.S., where he whiles away the time drooling over Jill, making out with his best friend Wesker and spanking the new guy Leon.
Well, you already understand what exactly seemed strange to me?
I accept that in a franchise like Resident Evil, over the years of its existence and the amount of content released, a voluminous lore has developed that is difficult to clearly convey to the screens without losing anything. And that, of course, something will have to be cut.
But my problem is not this, but the fact that changes may take place, but they do not have an ounce of banal human logic.
Okay, you combined the Nest lab under the police station and the one under Spencer’s mansion into a single location under the orphanage, okay. Okay, now the shelter is protected by Umbrella, and not by Chief of Police Irons, I understand, you need to move the plot along. Okay, S.T.A.R.S. Now it’s not a special squad, but so-so punks on the fence, a new canon – new rules. Raccoon City is now almost a ghost town from which Umbrella is reeling in fishing rods? Let’s agree that this was some kind of social commentary…
But what, in the name of all Great Demons, have you done with the characters?.
Characters
Let me tell you about those characters that seem at least remotely similar to game prototypes.
Chris and… And that’s basically it, you won’t find more canon until the post-credits scene. Yes, and the same Chris, kind of painfully stupid, but Wesker is at the same stage of negative development, so he balances.
Speaking of Wesker. She and Redfield seem https://reblzcasino.co.uk/mobile-app/ to have come out of the same test tube. Jocks, shirtless guys, dull, randomly running back and forth. Just like in games, it suddenly turns out that he has some ambitions of his own, but they boil down to the motivation “I want a lot of money.”. The conflict, if there was one, was insignificant. And then we also find out that Albert is a call girl for the left uncles. I thought that this movie character couldn’t upset me more than when he was killed by a door in the fifteenth series of Andersen’s films, but I was wrong.
Claire acts like she doesn’t have enough lead in her body. Outwardly it looks like the original, but internally he is such a repulsive person..
And of course the star of this whole circus is Leon his mother Kennedy. Dumb, cowardly, armless, useless, a backstory discrediting everything that was created in the original. This is not the same character who has been pushing the industry for years. This is now a kind of male version of Ashley from the fourth part. I pray that in the end it turns out that he and the real Leon Scott Kennedy are just complete namesakes. Hope dies last.
Oh, and there was Jill… Well, she was there, and that was the end of her role.
The main problem is that the good guys have stopped being likable characters. Chris is stupid, Claire is a bitch, Leon is weak.
And as a counterbalance: Police Chief Irons is now kind, the monster Lisa, broke the neck of a licker and carries the keys to the Umbrella laboratory with him, probably works part-time as a concierge, and Wesker is not a bad guy in general and he is very ashamed that he decided to betray his friends.
Not enough monsters either. For the entire film: one Cerberus, one Lizun, one Lisa, one Birkin and a zombie/mutant guest. Neither the Tyrant nor the hunters for you.
Well I don’t know what to say. All my powers are here.
Good points made
There are some good moments and positive changes, although not many.
An orphanage with propaganda posters and a disturbing atmosphere is a great location, somewhat reminiscent of the school location from the second Dead Space. I would take a walk there and see how scientists brainwashed orphans to be loyal to the corporation. This time.
The entire concept of the “Raccoon City Incident” changed the concept. Now it’s not exactly a single flash. Umbrella poisoned the water in the city for years, causing the residents to slowly but surely mutate. And some zombies look not like walking corpses, but like people disfigured by mutation. But not everything, it would be nice if they talked about this in more detail, since it is not clear what the paths of mutation development depend on. That’s two.
There were attempts to explain why the main characters do not become infected with the virus, although they breathe the same air and drink the same water as the city residents. It all boiled down to the fact that they were fosterlings of Umbrella and were specially studied, but Wesker still got infected later, and the mechanism of mutations was not really explained. But I’ll count it as an attempt. That’s three.
References
At some points, the writers really scratched my inner fanboy. I may not have noticed everything, but it’s even more interesting, maybe you’ll see more.
The trucker character and his plot came straight from the prologue of the remake of the second part. They also showed the Cerberus monster with him, which will later haunt Irons in the parking lot of the site.
There’s a shot of the main lobby of the Police Station, it’s straight out of the game. I even screamed with joy, but then stupid Leon, sleeping at his post, didn’t hear a fuel tanker explode five meters away from him, but immediately heard a shot and my joy diminished.
Before I had time to move away from how suddenly Liza, who had suddenly become more cheerful, snapped the licker’s neck, she was already handing Claire a bunch of keys. Yeah, yeah, those same ones, aces-hearts-diamonds.
Sometimes during scenes in the Spencer mansion, the camera would freeze from above in one of the corners of the rooms. If you’ve played, you’ll understand.
There is also a scene in which Wesker and Valentine, while running around the mansion, find a piano in one of the rooms and Albert suddenly begins to solve a puzzle with its keys. And it’s so hilarious and sudden that I even sincerely laughed. But Wesker had a PDA with hints, you fucking cheater.
In the dungeon under the shelter, Claire and Leon found a recording of Alexia and Alfred Ashward. The same one from “The Veronica Code”. Reshot one to one. But Birkin was there (sort of), so they still managed to disrupt the timeline.
Birkin also has a jar of Kadu from Resident Evil Village in his office . I saw it with my own eyes.
And one last time about Doctor Birkin. Doc only has two stages for the entire film. But! Defeating the last one, Chris shoots right in the eyes. It’s a small thing, but it’s nice. And then the unfortunate doctor, according to all Resident Evil canons, is finally killed with a shot from a rocket launcher.
In the post-credits scene, Wesker "comes to life" in a body bag. There was a similar scene in one of the animated films.
Conclusion
I really don’t know what to say about this movie. This movie made me sad and angry and I couldn’t relate to the story. I didn’t like the characters. I didn’t like most of the changes.
But as a gamer, I had my share of fun. True, all the fun came down to the search for canon and references. The movie isn’t good and isn’t even so bad it’s good.
I recommend watching it, but only because I seriously doubt that something so close to the Resident canon will ever appear on the big screen again.
(There is a post-credits scene where Ada Wong is introduced. Apparently, the groundwork for a continuation. Now I really have a question for the couple Leon and Ada. Firstly, they will never meet in this film, and secondly, how will this little Leon approach her?. It’s as if Ethan suddenly started making eyes at Lady Dimitrescu or Lord Heisenberg in Part 8. Awkward and doesn’t make sense.)
Best comments
Paul, Paul Anderson. Wes Anderson is a completely different person, a director of decent films (The Grand Budapest Hotel, Moonrise Kingdom, The French Messenger, they say, is good), and Paul makes passable action films, mostly based on games (except that it’s not customary to scold him for Mortal Kombat).
Otherwise, the review is very emotional and chaotic in places (although I think, “hot on the heels” right from the cinema, I would have written the same thing), but, unlike Krasnopolskaya’s review, I read it (her phrase about the best embodiment, despite what I saw in the poor trailer, somehow immediately put me off from further reading, fortunately, the situation was saved in the comments by Daur), and on the whole it fulfills its function – to tell that the film is controversial, checkpoint. In terms of – mostly fans.a service for fans of the series, but with the artistic and logical part everything is somehow sad. Thank you, maybe I’ll watch it someday on the Internet when there’s nothing to watch or I’m in the mood to “turn off my brain”)
Oh god! Thanks a lot!
I just recently rewatched The Grand Budapest and my head got a little confused.
Otherwise, the review is very emotional and chaotic in places (although I think, “hot on the heels” right from the cinema, I would have written the same), but I, unlike Krasnopolskaya’s review, read it
Well, I’m not a professional critic, so I don’t like to go into discussions about art and artistic value. I always thought that the point of reviews is to share experiences, good or bad. Here the film was physically painful to watch, but sparks of interest flashed when the eye clung to something familiar.
I already knew that the film would not be a masterpiece based on the trailers, I just wanted to know how bad it was. You can see what the reaction is.
(her phrase about the best incarnation despite what I saw in the wretched trailer somehow immediately put me off from further reading, fortunately the situation was saved by Daur in the comments)
I think she was talking about the closest incarnation to film canon. I had the same thesis, I just didn’t stop there.
Thank you, maybe I’ll watch it someday on the Internet when there’s nothing to watch or I’m in the mood to “turn off my brain”)
I won’t lie, with a beer and in the company of friends the film may not even be bad, but it’s not bad in the sense of “we had fun screaming “BOOOO” at the screen!“and throwing popcorn at him”
thank you for your comment)
For some reason, many people say that this film adaptation unites the plot of the first and second parts of the game, but completely ignore the fact that it completely and forever erases the events of the third part. The only thing that somehow unites the film with the third game is the fact that there is a Jill, and this Jill is in Raccoon City. All! Failure on all fronts. Goodbye Nemesis my friend. You were exchanged for the curly hair of Leon S. Kennedy. Ugh, fuck!
The tyrants also went completely under the knife
except that they left space for the Zero parts (I would look by the way)
Good analysis. As for me, all the film adaptations just miss the mark, none of them convey the spirit of RE.
It’s a pity that they didn’t include the Baker family there, there weren’t enough of them there.
Well… In principle, it was expected that a film from a third-rate director, with a small budget, second-rate (grade) actors and a bunch of “jokes for our own”, would turn out to be an extremely weak show. Goes straight off my “possible” watch list.
And according to the list I have there now… Yeah. Hawkeye! Next there will be a lot of "Bro". Because I was so filled with the series that I read the entire fourth volume of the original comic.
"-In short, bro: this new sirik of yours “Hawkeye” took the fourth volume of the original comic as a basis, bro. Or more precisely, bro, the elements of the story and characters. Barton, as in the comics, is losing his hearing and is generally in a bad mood. Like, he doesn’t have superpowers and we hurt like you and me, bro. But unlike the original, he has a family. Less than us Tracksuits, bro, but still. And then there’s this topic that Ronin’s old outfit came up at some auction. Although, damn, this is a “spoiler”, bro. No! Not the same spoilers as on racing cars… Who cares?? In short, Kate Bishop’s suit dropped. Yes, the same Bishop from the comics. I know that they are old friends there, bro. In the series they were reset, bro. And in place of the dead mother we have a father… Yes, what spoilers, bro? This is shown in the first five minutes, bro. Do you want a real spoiler, bro??! You get it, Ne-bro! We were the ones who broke into that auction, bro! We wanted to pick up some kind of McHafen, but we forgot about it already in the first episode, and we are stupidly chasing that lady bro. That’s what our dad said, Ivan, the stupid little head. Like Serik himself? Yes, a light action movie… What do the Americans call these… "New Year’s Eve" In short, it turned out to be a blast. Looking forward to the continuation. Why is Kazi yelling again?? Okay let’s go bro. And this. I forgive you."
P.S.: What nonsense did I write??! I’m sorry for your eyes and brain. And how do you like the first episodes, bro??
Firstly, euphemism is different. Here is “put a bolt”, which does not mean a bolt at all – this is a euphemism, so don’t mindlessly copy Wikipedia.
Secondly, the line between films of category A and B is so blurred that in the same English article, Tarantino’s “Reservoir Dogs”, and Verhoeven’s “Total Recall”, and “Die Hard 2” with Bruce Willis, and “Home Alone” are attributed to the Bahams. T.e. WHAT. And all sorts of critics only make things worse by adding that there are films with an A-class budget and B-class dialogues. The guys themselves haven’t decided what it is and everyone uses it as they want. In the generally accepted sense, it means that the film is second-rate, not art house, made intentionally or unintentionally bad.
In this context, Bashki are not experiments. People confuse B-movie and low budget, but these are two independent parameters. You can have a low budget and not be a Baha. Thirdly, Movies based on King, for example “It”, were not Bshkami. Just because a movie looks bad today doesn’t mean it’s a B movie. Fourth. the fact that B-category films have degenerated is generally a joke, no matter how you look at it. I can continue the list, but I don’t want to choke too much. I’ll just add that most of the plot confusion in the film was explained and the author is simply inattentive. And in general, this is more likely not a review, but some kind of emotional statement after going to the cinema. I won’t give a minus, but please correct it.