Following the wide-ranging success of his highly acclaimed “Weapons”, writer-director Zach Cregger stays in the genre he knows best with his latest feature, “Resident Evil”. Yes, the long-running and wildly popular survival horror video game series that began all the way back in 1996. Cregger plucks a few things from the chilling and twisted franchise while bringing along his own grisly blend of horror and humor. The result is a mixed bag that has a better chance of satisfying casual horror fans and the RE faithful.
Of course this isn’t the first time Resident Evil has found its way onto the screen. Regardless of whether you’ve seen them all, most people are at least familiar with the six live-action Resident Evil features from creator Paul W.S. Anderson and starring Milla Jovovich which ran from 2002 to 2017. Fewer will remember the failed attempt to reboot the series in 2021. Now Cregger is taking his own dramatically different swing at it.
It’s hard to tell Cregger’s level of affection for RE just by watching his adaptation. On one hand, the world he creates is dark, mysterious, and appropriately grotesque. The zombies are fittingly creepy and the mutating monsters are the kind of macabre creations that have frequented the RE games for years. But on the other hand, rather than making a gnarly, blood-lathered chiller, Cregger seems far more interested in making a gnarly, blood-lathered comedy. He routinely undermines the horror by rarely taking anything seriously. And it begins with with his relentlessly goofy protagonist.
Rather than pulling an established name from the pre-existing mythology, Cregger smartly introduces a brand-new character into the chilling RE world. Austin Abrams plays Bryan, an ordinary guy thrust into an extraordinary (and quite horrific) situation. Bryan is a medical courier by day, transporting critical and time-sensitive supplies between hospitals, clinics, and laboratories. But he’s somewhat distracted by his personal life, more specifically the news that his girlfriend Michelle is pregnant.
After delivering a vital organ to an awaiting surgeon, Bryan agrees to take an urgent late-night delivery to Raccoon City General Hospital. He does so partially because he’ll be paid double, but also to avoid going home and facing the pregnancy with Michelle. But it doesn’t take long before the job takes an ill-fated turn. While slipping and sliding along a dark, snow-covered mountain road, Bryan strikes a woman who lurches out in front of his car. This kicks off a gruesome chain of events that propels the story forward.
One of the film’s biggest strengths is its intense focus on survival horror which happens to be where it resembles the RE video games the most. Cregger thrusts Bryan into a series of harrowing encounters, leaving him to manage each on his own despite being in way over his head. He fumbles with guns, fights off ferocious dogs, scrambles to find keys, navigates tunnels, etc., all while running for his life from an array of hideous and vicious nasties. The pacing is electric and there is no shortage of insanely imaginative carnage.
At the same time, outside of the opening few minutes, it’s hard to consider any of “Resident Evil” scary. That’s because the frequent attempts at humor overpower nearly every effort to frighten us. And it starts with Bryan. When he’s not endlessly muttering profanities at himself for laughs, he’s comically blundering about which often puts him in more precarious situations. Yes, the idea is that he’s just a normal guy who’s ill-equipped for the crisis he’s facing. But his mishaps are too often played as jokes. I’m certainly not opposed to moments of levity. But when it neuters the impact of the horror, it’s too much.
The above frustrations might have been easier to overlook if the movie could have delivered a solid finish. Instead we get a glaring non-ending, where stupidity is laced with brutality, right up to the point where Cregger seems to shut the camera off mid-scene. It’s a silly and hollow final fifteen minutes. And despite a couple of good blood splats and some delightfully disgusting monster mutations, it leaves you with an unsatisfying aftertaste.
Zach Cregger’s “Resident Evil” can be a maddening experience. It does so much well – the crisp pacing, the chilling world, the gruesome monster mayhem. But its fixation on injecting some degree of humor into nearly every situation often kills the suspense. And the ludicrous and lazy non-ending certainly doesn’t help. Still, the film packs some truly wild and gory set pieces and has enough Easter Eggs scattered throughout to entertain those with their expectations in check. But it’s a far cry from being the movie it could have been.
VERDICT – 2.5 STARS
Unless it turns into a franchise, I’ll be avoiding it.
Oh it seems that’s the plan.
Then there’s a chance I’ll watch these. I want a bigger story than just what one videogame tie-in can provide.
This one doesn’t tell much of a story at all. It definitely will need more.
i concur with this review especially regarding the ending
Thanks for reading and commenting. The final 15 minutes are absurd and the lack of a finish really soured me.
loved it from start to finish
Sad but I’m not shocked. I’m so exhausted from movies that are too lazy to do an ending properly, or simply drop off because all they want to do is set up another movie. Take First Blood for instance, they didn’t want to disappoint viewers by having Rambo die at the end, plus killing him off would ruin any hopes of another. But they ended the movie. Rambo 2 had an ending. They can end the movie and still leave the door open in most cases.
I 100% agree. This was such a clumsy and lazy ending. And as you mentioned, it doesn’t have to be this way.
I don’t think I would have been nearly as disappointed if the trailer had been honest about the movie’s tone. The trailer made it look like we were getting a grounded, serious survival-horror story set inside the Resident Evil universe—basically an ordinary person experiencing the kind of nightmare we see in the games from a civilian perspective.
That was what excited me.
So when the actual movie turned out to be much more of an absurd horror-comedy, where characters constantly make ridiculous decisions and tense moments are repeatedly undercut for a joke, it felt less like a creative choice I simply didn’t enjoy and more like I had been sold a different movie.
It’s funny, I said something similar about the trailer. What we get wasn’t what was advertised.
I mean I guess. The ending was the beginning of the story. I think it’s a neat telling that will set up the rest of the story if that’s where it goes. The only truly cheese part for me was him glorifying video games in the mop scene. Could have done without it. But the movie is comedic because it portrayed feelings and moments all players of the game have had. It’s nostalgic in feel and when you’re watching it you can just feel the pain he’s in like you’re watching your buddy play it for the first time. I think that was the vision and the point.
For me it was so much more than that. The zombie lady always playing with his face, the constant silly muttering to himself, the late scene with the scientists which was nothing more than a goofy slapstick sequence. Just too much for me.
total disagree have fun and enjoy it’s creativity you critics can just relax the humor is great
This movie was the stupidest movie I’ve ever seen yet.
I’d probably like this one 🤣🤣🤣
🤣🤣🤣 I’m guessing not!
At this point in the RE movie domain, I expect them to suck. I assumed from the get-go that this was going to be goofy horror and apparently thats what it is. So I’ll wait for streaming and go into it knowing what i know. It’s gotta be better than expecting a good horror and getting the slop that the padt 5 or 6 or 7 REs were.
So disappointing considering the excitement when this project was announced with Cregger at the helm. It sounds like a real mess, and definitely not the movie I envisioned he would make for this franchise.
It has its moments. But almost all of them are on the technical side. The rest left me pretty disappointed.
I didn’t have a problem with the horror/comedy balance until we got to that last 20-30 mins. Then it went off the rails. I still enjoyed the movie over all, but I really didn’t care for the 3rd act at all.
I thought the third act was horrible. The whole slapstick keystone scientists bit was such a bizarre choice!
This movie went from a solid 7.5/10 for me to a flat 3. All because of that unbelievably stupid ending.
Oh gosh, that ending was horrible. From the slapstick silliness of the keystone scientists to the lazy final shot. It was really bad.