Amazon.co.uk Review
2002's popular video-game-derived hit
Resident Evil didn't inspire confidence in a sequel, but
Resident Evil: Apocalypse defies odds and surpasses expectations. It's a bigger, better, action-packed zombie thriller, and this time Milla Jovovich (as the first film's no-nonsense heroine) is joined by more characters from the popular Capcom video games, including Jill Valentine (played by British hottie Sienna Guillory) and Carlos Olivera (Oded Fehr, from 1999's
The Mummy). They're armed and ready for a high-caliber encounter with devil dogs, mutant "Lickers," lurching zombies, and the leather-clad monster known only as Nemesis, unleashed by the nefarious Umbrella Corporation responsible for creating the cannibalistic undead horde. Having gained valuable experience as a respected second-unit director on high-profile films like
Gladiator and
The Bourne Identity, director Alexander Witt elevates this junky material to the level of slick, schlocky entertainment.
--Jeff Shannon
Synopsis
Milla Jovovich is back with a vengeance as amnesiac, genetically-altered zombie ass-kicker, Alice, in this sequel to the 2002 hit film, which is based on the video game. This time around the sinister Umbrella Corporation sends a team of investigators into their destroyed underground lab (the ground-zero of carnage in the previous film) and unwittingly unleash the still-staggering zombies and monsters out into the population of Raccoon City. Soon Umbrella has evacuated all of their own key employees and has shut everyone else inside to be devoured. A mastermind chemist's daughter gets left behind in the confusion, and she is the one ticket out for Alice and a handful of dwindling survivors, including the almost-as-tough lady cop, Jill Valentine (Sienna Guillory). There's some nifty motorcycle riding, plenty of bullets and splattering blood, and even a new monster--the hulking, heavily-armoured, seriously ugly Nemesis. Comic actor Mike Epps is great as a pimped-out hustler who handles the whole dead-coming-back-to-life thing with cool nonchalance. In some ways, this non-stop creep show is even an improvement over the original, with a pervasive mood of nihilistic corporate dehumanisation adding extra concern about the future of civilization to the mix of shooting, dying, punching, and munching.