Vault Dwellers Delight: Movie Review of Resident Evil: Extinction

Well, just a quick little update to let you all know that I'm still alive and doing very well. For gaming related purposes, then the Road to Avalon campaign got started last week, after having tidied up Version 1.0 (which is still undergoing layout and what not), and already I'm at the bottom of the ladder.

Just goes to show that even though I designed the damn thing then I have no sense of tactics nor luck with the dice. Oh well, fun was had by all! And in my book, that's the most important thing about gaming; tell a story, have some fun and roll some dice.

And now, back to the topic!

Resident Evil: Extinction

or
"Let me get this straight; I just blew $15 on this?"


Normally, I'm the kind of guy who believes in the old saying; "If you've got nothing nice to say, then don't say anything." That is, until I happened to watch this very, very bland movie.

Don't get me wrong though, the premise of the film does actually look interesting! We've got a cool chick gone scavenger/wanderer, a convoy of shabby looking scavengers and their vehicles, a wasted desert, a lack of gasoline, an evil corporation - and zombies by the hundreds!

And that's all there is.

Oh, you hoped for a plot? Well, if you like the kind of plot that goes into your slightly-above standard MTV music video, then it's really deep. If you're going to compare it to other zombie-flicks, then it's just all seen before. Although, I must add that the Mad-Max-elements were kinda refreshing. But really, that's all there is. I went from hyped to bored in less than 4 minutes. It's not like the movie doesn't have some good elements to work with, it's just that... well... it doesn't work with them!

For instance, we have the main character. There could be some character development going on there - if only she'd talk! Actress Milla Jovovich, while looking nice as always, basically have two modes in this film: sombre or kill. There's little inbetween.

Oh sure, they try to add a couple of average fair subplots (the Motherhood, Lost Lover, Mainly here to try and add a twist type of subplots), but none of them get intensity. No, it's just stuff that happens for a given scene, and then it's forgotten as the plot moves forward.

Seriously, having a small group of survivors going from "Can we trust her" to "Yay! You are our very bestest friend evah" in less than 10 minutes (that is, 10 minutes of the movie's realtime, not the actual running length of the movie) just goes to show that there's no meat to the bones they try to throw at the actors. Sigh

There are, of course, a supporting cast - and every single one of them get hit by the average zombie-film cliché; bitten, panicked, out of ammo, overrun trying to save others etc. And well, there's nothing really to write about them, because they really don't feature in the film unless to give said main character either something to be sombre about or something to kill.

And the bad-guy? Well, he's just deranged in a very normal and run-of-the-mill way. Again, bland seems to be the favorite dish served during the filming of this movie.

And don't even get me started on the themes or the absolutely absent plot - in my oppinion, the writer/director wanted to tell a story about the main character, but then felt it could be fun to add another story - trying to please two camps, and failing at both. Especially because the main-character has one screen presence, and that is either sombre or kill.

So what is it actually good for?

Well. Uhm. Okay, the vehicles are actually really cool! The designers really went to town by taking normal vehicles, beefing them up in a believeable way and then had some fun dirtying up a couple of locations here and there. Oh, and the desert buried town was kinda cool - if meaningless to the overall absent plot.

I got a few ideas from it, but wouldn't really recommend it to anyone. It's not bad enough to become unintentionally funny so there's not even any fun in watching it for that. It's just bland, with all the flavor of bland removed. At least it has good looking scavenger vehicles and Milla Jovovich. That helped immensely!

Final Verdict

0.5 Megatonnes (out of 10 possible)
Good stuff: Cool zombies, Milla Jovovich and Scavenger Vehicles
Bad stuff: The blandness of it all; I never could imagine that the world following the apocalypse would be so boring.

Tune in next week for more Post Apocalypse mayhem, where I'll have something more cheery to show and tell for the day. And it'll involve yet another Car conversion!

As always, comments and feedback is very much appreciated!

Cheers and Happy Gaming!
- Torben