Coluna Claquete - September, 21th 2012

Movie of the Week: "Resident Evil: Retribution"

As I have mentioned several times in this column, the excess of sequels distorts and trivializes a hero or a theme that was successful in the original film.It is therefore a pleasant and surprising exception the case of Resident Evil movies, which arrive to the fifth sequel, "Resident Evil: Retribution", with a notable dose of qualities and surprises.

Resident Evil, also known as Biohazard in Japan, is a media franchise that belongs to the video game company Capcom.It was created by Shinji Mikami as a series of survival horror games, started in 1996 with Resident Evil for PlayStation. Since then, the game series has included the action genre, and so far has sold over fifty million units.

The first adaptation to theaters was made in 2002 with the title "Resident Evil", directed by Paul W. S. Anderson, and starred by Milla Jovovich and Michelle Rodriguez. The history shown in the movie was based freely on the early versions of the game, but did not bring the classic characters, introducing the heroine Alice.

In the plot, Alice (Milla Jovovich) wakes forgetful, in the bathroom of a mansion, which sits on a megacorporation Umbrella's secret laboratory, where they were developed bioweapons. An accident spreads the T-virus that turns people into zombies. A team of professional soldiers is sent to investigate the situation, taking Alice with them. The girl is the only survivor, and when she leaves the lab, the virus has spread throughout Raccoon City.

After the tremendous success of the original film, the sequences came "Resident Evil: Apocalypse" (2004), "Resident Evil: Extinction" (2007), "Resident Evil: Afterlife" (2010), and the current "Resident Evil: Retribution ".

In the current movie, the opening was magnificently displayed with the end of the previous film shown in rewind, ie backwards.Moreover, the character Alice (Milla Jovovich) appears with a brief and important description of all previous films, contextualizing the viewer who sees the series for the first time.

We discovered then that Alice is in an Umbrella facility in northern Russia, where there are replicas of New York, Tokyo, Moscow, and American suburbs, where human clones are used to test and show to prospective buyers the effects of T-virus.

Alice is helped out of his cell by Ada Wong (Li Binqbinq) sent by Albert Wesker (Shawn Roberts), the villain of the previous film, which provides aid for this girl to join him against Umbrella.He also sends a group to help the two women to leave the facility.

But for the group to get away, they will face many obstacles, because besides the "normal" zombies, we have some monstrous giants that resemble the Thing of the Fantastic Four, zombie-soldiers armed with machine guns that look nazi soldiers, beyond Umbrella soldiers, led by Jill Valentine (Sienna Gillory) and Rain Ocampo (Michelle Rodriguez), and under the command of the powerful Red Queen, the supercomputer shown in the original film.

The result of all this? Incessant action, from beginning to end the film with a profusion of gunfire and blasts, packaged by a soundtrack of heavy rock, many scenes in slow motion, especially in the beautiful scenes of choreographed fights.

If the story does not have much complexity, the climate game will please fans of the games who complained about the distance of the original games.Regardless, lovers of action films, very common in current generations will not have to complain about.

For those who complain about the violence in these types of film, the excuse is that there are not people dying, but monsters, and of course, zombies - that are already dead. The philosophy is the same of the games: shoot everything that moves, to get out alive from the level.

"Resident Evil: Retribution" is a product tailored to audiences of today, with lots of action and little thought, to be consumed like popcorn. For those who prefer a drama, comedy, or something with a deeper screenplay, it is better look for another option.

Moreover, we can conclude that one of the reasons for success of the brand is the ukrainian Milla Jovovich, who kills zombies and monsters with the same angelic expression she had on her debut at age of 13 in "The Night Train To Katmandu", when she signed herself simply Milla.