Bless you Paul W.S. Anderson. I was sitting at home, gutted, thinking that I wouldn’t be catching an enjoyable bad film this Autumn, yet you roll out another plate of tripe from your bastardisation of the Resident Evil videogame series with the fifth instalment of the film franchise. Being fair, the fourth one brought the quality back to an acceptable level, but can Resident Evil: Retribution carry on an upward trend? Oh hell no!
Following the cliffhanger attack on the oil tanker prison at the end of Afterlife, Project Alice (Milla Jovovich, The Fifth Element) gets recaptured by the world-ending Umbrella Corporation. In an underwater scenario experiment station in Russia, she gets broken out by ex-enemy Wesker and his right hand agent Ada Wong (Li Bingbing, The Forbidden Kingdom). The goal is to rendezvous with a strike team led by Leon Kennedy (Johann Urb, 2012) and Barry Burton (Kevin Durand, Real Steel) through recreations of Moscow and New York, and the legions of undead zombies and mutants, controlled by the Red Queen computer.
This isn’t the kind of film you come to for high quality acting, instead the cast are here just to provide roles and fan service; Jovovich is the typical Mary-Sue archetype as Alice (as she has been all the way through the series), and since we’re up to the fifth film, we know what we’re getting from Milla – a reasonably attractive woman in skin tight suit doing gunkarta and backflips – her dialogue delivery leaves something to be desired, and her emotional reactions to crowbarred in moments of tenderness are as blank as a slate.
There’s not much to write about the rest, except for Durand as Burton; who hams it up as he knows the kind of film he’s in and, as if by accident, delivers a really great film adaptation of his character. Urb looks like Kennedy from the games (albeit a bit skinny), but doesn’t have the cool aura about him at all, and Li has an accurate look to Wong, but she’s put into the same tough-action-chick without much character development.
Retribution also decides to bring loads of previous cast members as clones or brainwashed versions of characters they’ve played for little to no reason; even when the guy Alice had a thing for in the third film comes back from the dead there’s hardly any emotional impact; and the only real reaction to any of this is a throwaway line to one of Michelle Rodriquez’s (Battle: Los Angeles) characters to which she replies “I don’t know who you are lady.” Quite frankly, I don’t know what Retribution is doing in the first place; the only major character from this mob of returners who does anything relevant or interesting is the brainwashed Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory, Eragon), and despite being pushed as an equal to Alice in the action department, it’s clear all she is is another attractive woman in tight outfit showing off her cleavage.
The crippling problem throughout this series is that the Alice character has simply gone overboard with powerful she is; supposedly she has de-powered from her over the top psychic powers in the earlier films, but she doesn’t have problem in slowing down for any of the undead here. There’s no reason to fear for her safety at all, and this is part of the Mary-Sue aspect, which is fascinating as she’s the one everyone’s talking about/after/wants to kill etc. despite the fact she suffers from not having a personality. Not even a boring one. The blank piece of paper the audience has to work with is not really watchable with someone with as limited charisma as Jovovich. Accept the nepotism between Jovovich and husband/director Anderson (The Three Musketeers), and perhaps you can start to see where the massive levels of focus is coming from.
What’s odd is the clash of quality between the tributes to characters and moments from the Resident Evil video games. There are some characters done right (like Barry Burton; who is bang on in terms of looks, style and tone), and at least Leon Kennedy appears the same as his joypad counterpart, but then Retribution will throw in something from the games which has no real reason to work in a film setting and fails miserably; is it really necessary for Ada Wong to have her Chinese prostitute dress and high heels outfit in this film? Can’t imagine it’s practical to do flips and kung fu for a ‘secret’ agent in something that could be sold on a Shanghai street corner.
There are some exceptionally poor mutants and zombies which have made the jump from the games too; the inclusion of the 10 foot tall behemoth zombies wearing Mad Max style armour with sacks over their head and nails nailed into their skin is a stupid move (especially when they bust out their giant axes the size of a Harley Davidson motorbike). In fact, there’s no solid main villain in the entire film out and out explained to us; The Red Queen is meant to be the big bad but she’s hardly seen, and utterly inept as this master computer out to kill the escapees – she tries launching wave after wave of single mutant creatures, she doesn’t think to do something as simple as hit the “select all” button.
The story is dull and hackneyed. Of course being the fifth instalment in the series, Retribution isn’t accessible for newcomers and rather unclear; they won’t get too much out of the Jill Valentine brainwashing plot arc which has been running in the background for the last few films, but then again, it’s the same case for fans of the series; as plot points and important lines of dialogue are kept low-key, despite the massive spurge of dialogue at the film’s opening (which pretty much gives everything away; even the twist at the end of the film; which annoys everyone, since all it does is press a massive reset button).
Blame lies squarely at the feet of Anderson; because with the great profit earned on the earlier series entires, he has far too much free and creative reign to write, direct and produce whatever he sees fit with the Resident Evil licence; his wife is the star of a franchise which she has no connection to, the lack of emotional and emotive tone is worrying and what passes as it (essentially shoehorning in a sympathetic deaf girl, and Alice acting like a super mom) is vomit inducing, and his disregard for source material, and choices from it, are ridiculous. There’s no honcho above him to calm him down and tell him what works and what doesn’t. Sure he’s bringing in the money, but it lacks the quality to recommend.
The scary thing is, the really scary thing… Anderson can, actually, do really good action scenes; as much as there’s bile for most of this film (and deservedly so), the action scenes in this film are immense; there are so many utterly ridiculous, but at the same time entertaining, moments that it’s worth the price of Retribution’s admission alone. With such highlights as a melee weapon fight out of nowhere on an ice shaft, a slow motion dismemberment of a gang of 20 zombies by Alice, and the Wong and Alice vs. the two giants battle it’s all really watchable, and reflect-ably ludicrous compared to the rest of the film
Retribution is nice film to look at too. Anderson gets the stylish quality down to an excellent standard with some impressive setwork and overall makes it shiny enough to appease any zombie magpie. Weirdly, there’s some magnificent, but out of place, lighting effects which do not deserve to be in this; just take the scene where Alice enters a control room in the shape of a hexagon – the room’s background lighting gradually increases as each of the hexagonal pieces lights up separately, creating a really neat effect. The 3D addition is annoying since it’s the only way to catch this film, but a HD version would benefit; especially with the reversed opening getting the chance to be shown in full glory.
By now, if you don’t know what’re getting yourself in for with Anderson’s Resident Evil films then you only have yourself to blame. Some neat magician tricks doesn’t make the zombie circus completely good, but what’s notable is that whilst there are majorly bad aspects to Retribution, the level of entertainment you can get if you’re know what you’re watching Retribution for is outstanding. Highly enjoyable when not taken seriously.
Terry Lewis – @thatterrylewis.
