Undescribable Perfection

the audience applauded

Save your money for something good and enjoyable

The acting in this movie is really good.

Resident Evil: Apocalypse didn't quite work for me. It isn't as fun or as frightening as the original. There are some entertaining moments as well as some scary ones, but, for the most part, it's a cliched mess of action sequences.

The quest for mediocrity continues with this direct sequel. Despite the change of director and a full on charge to the action genre, it still falls short of being a good film. Alice wakes up, Raccoon City is ravaged by abandonment, she walks around until she stumbles across Jill Valentine. They are tasked with extracting a young girl out of the quarantined city before it becomes decimated in order to fight back against the T-Virus. Would I class this as an improvement over its predecessor? Tough to say. Most fans of the series will say this is the best instalment, and I can see why. Jill Valentine, despite Sienna Guillory looking like she is cosplaying, does kick ass and gives Alice a run for her money. Two strong female protagonists is refreshing to see. The stunts were well executed, including Alice running down a building whilst being attached to a cable. Nemesis looked great, although unfortunately incredibly underused and not nearly as threatening as he should be. If you played the game, you would know he is relentless. In this, not so much. The horror aspect obviously did not work in the first instalment, so completely shifting this into action gear was more suited. Milla Jovovich gives an enjoyably daring performance as we watch her grow into an action star. It is unfortunate that the story is somewhat underwhelming...again. Point A to point B to point C. Roll credits. The way the seperate parties unite feels far too coincidental. Although really do we care? They are so one dimensional that if any meet their demise, I feel nothing. The fight choreography has this generic annoying sound effect for every punch and kick. The over reliance of tilted camera angles makes Alexander Witt's directing style feel amateurish. Also, the full five minute expositional introduction was a waste of time that could've been spent developing the characters. Again, the series remains mediocre but somewhat watchable.

I'll start by saying that Resident Evil 2 (or 'Apocalypse' to give it its correct name) wasn't that well received. The first film was (loosely!) based on a computer game and kind of went some way to revitalise the 'zombie' genre (or at least bring the undead back into the mainstream again). However, whereas the original was widely well received by people who like a good B-movie, its second outing was pretty much trashed. And, yes, I can see why – but I still liked it! It carries on nicely from the original after a zombie outbreak occurs in a secret lab complex under a major (fictional) city. Now the virus has been released on the above ground population and the city is basically falling to the numerous walking corpses while the authorities struggle to maintain order. Throw in the only survivor from the first movie (a semi-naked Milla Jovovich) and you have your film.I'll start by listing its – numerous – faults. The cast are wafer thin cardboard cut-outs and every piece of dialogue is by-the-numbers and feels like it's been written by a first year film student. There's no such thing as 'character development' and you'll see every plot point coming. They even bring back the 'zombie dogs' from the first film and sort of rehash the scene again. The villain (yes, there's a human villain as well as the zombies) is – again – your typically badly-written Bond-villain rip-off. Then you have the 'Nemesis' – which is basically a man in a rubber suit pretending to be a monster. Everything here is 'style over substance' – the story (and maybe I should put 'story' in quote marks?) moves from one stylised fight-scene to another. You really will have to leave your brain at the door to get over the gaping holes in the plot which lead up to all the major characters getting together.Yet, despite all that – I confess to actually owning this film on DVD and watching it every few years. I found it quite fresh at the time. I've been a fan of the zombie genre since the seventies and missed them so much that I was quite glad to see a big budget film where you get to see a glimpse of society falling while the zombie outbreak is underway. The trick to getting something out of RE2 is basically lowering your expectations suitably to ignore all its faults. You'll probably have to know what Milla Jovovich's movies are generally like, i.e. superhuman female kicking the hell out of numerous faceless baddies (or zombies in this case). Don't expect too much. It's a complete B-movie where you can wander in and out of the room at will and still know exactly what's going on.I like it, but even if you do really hate it as much as the majority, it's still head and shoulders over every last sequel which follows (and there are a lot of those!).

Jill Valentine and three other people are holed up in an abandoned church trying to escape the ever growing army of zombies within Raccoon City (one of the stupidest names for a city ever!). They are in a battle against a group of Lickers and almost out of ammo, things look bleak.Suddenly a bright shines through the huge stained glass window...Alice blows through the glass mounted on top of a motorbike. She lands perfectly, informs the survivors to take cover and proceeds to blow away all the Lickers one by one in an eye shattering display of slow motion action enough to give any fanboy a hard on. At this exact moment the franchise dies, this is where the Resi Evil film franchise loses the gritty grown up 'Aliens' clone formula of the first film and enters the realm of hyper martial arts and lots and lots of slow motion action.The character of Alice has been experimented on since the last film, apparently, which now gives her superhuman strength, speed and agility. This in turn takes the character and the film into the world of 'The Matrix' and absurd action set pieces.Don't get me wrong the film isn't entirely bad, the atmosphere and visuals of the film are decent whilst the abandoned Raccoon City is created very well. You do get a great sense of dread from the deserted city, it feels dangerous and eerie with a really nice dark tone. The film is still pretty adult I must say, there is plenty of blood, some gore and quite a few jump in your seat moments. The general survival concept is along the same lines as the first film with a small band of people trying to escape the City, its a solid idea which works. The problem is the inclusion of Alice who drags the film down utterly with her over the top macho invincibility.The inclusion of Nemesis was of course required by all Resi fans and he is faithfully created, amazingly, although a bit rubbery. Not being a fanboy myself I just don't get why the Umbrella Corp would release this huge monster simply to kill the remaining S.T.A.R.S. members. Was this some kind of field test? and the fact they planned to nuke the City wouldn't that somewhat negate their precious creation? On top of that they make Alice fight this big guy for no real reason other than to have an exciting finale fight in the film...oh and something about seeing who is stronger, err why??? All that work just to have him fight Alice?!The problem as said before is quite simply the character of Alice and the fact we have to follow her around from one superhero sequence to the next. On top of that you have the pathetic alpha female rivalry between Jill and Alice (and both actresses) as both compete for sexiest zombie killer. Jill wins purely down to her ridiculously skimpy outfit which is obviously in there just for the teen male audience. Because of course most special unit cops wear tight hot pants and a tight vest when in terror situations...wait this is a serious film?Its a brave attempt which literately just keeps its head above the waves and manages to be a reasonable film. Shame about all the slow motion crap but this is what happens when Jovovich is in a film. The film is basically let down by stupid action sequences which vomit on your suspension of disbelief, had these bits been more sensible or relatively realistic then the film could have been pretty solid.5/10