Resident Evil
I have never played a game in the “Resident Evil” franchise. The only movie I have watched- though we own all of the live-action ones- is the 2002 Paul W.S. Anderson franchise starter with Milla Jovovich, which I did not care for. I mention this to say that I have so low a threshold for how the franchise should be brought to life onscreen that it’s on the floor. Just give me a good movie, and credit to writer-director Zach Cregger (following up his Oscar-winning “Weapons”)- he delivered.
While I have been known to do some first-person shooter action in video games in the “Star Wars” universe with the “Battlefront” Xbox games, I hadn’t touched an old school one since the early aughts. My cousin Chad, I believe it was, brought up the “Half Life” PC gaming series when it came to the sound of my music, and I bought one of the games and played it. I’ve always been a casual gamer, with moments where I really dive into it. I bring up the first-person shooter thing because the way Cregger has shot “Resident Evil” reminded me of what it’s like playing a character, and following them as they go through the scripted scenario. The only difference is…you aren’t playing the character. I kind of wished I could have.
The main character is Bryan (Austin Abrams), a 20-something who works as a medical courier, and is tasked with getting something up to Raccoon City General. He really should be getting home to his girlfriend, who’s only heard in the film, but the money is good, horrible icy roads be damned. As he’s driving, a young woman darts out from the woods and hits his car. He goes to investigate. He really should be getting in his car and continuing on to the hospital. But that choice leads him on a nightmare journey that is going to cause a lot of anxiety the closer he gets to the hospital.
It is a well-worn archetype in horror movies to have characters make stupid decisions for the sake of the plot. There are very few times when it is deployed with tremendous success. When I say I wish I could have played as Bryan during this movie, I’m not just saying it because we share a name (albeit with him spelling it incorrectly lol). While yes, there would have been a pang of guilt in not going after the girl Bryan hits with a car, intellectually I felt like, we need to keep moving. Same with later when a car gets overturned. Got to keep moving forward. Of course, that’s not the movie Cregger set out to make, and let’s face it- who am I to argue? Because after all, that’s how Cregger is building his early set pieces, with one mistake after another the character makes making his journey trickier. In all honesty, I like that Cregger decided to make the main character a regular individual caught in an escalating situation and not a scientist or special forces soldier in the middle of the shit. The choice reminded me, in a positive way, of “Cloverfield,” and it pays off as Bryan’s situation gets all the more perilous, not always from choices of his own.
At a brisk 95 minutes, “Resident Evil” feels like the right length for this type of story. Cregger is making a haunted house-type movie where the location changes and shifts, and the dangers escalate. Yes, there are preposterous set pieces like the one set in an elevator, but there’s also one on a skybridge that really gets to the essence of how Cregger and cinematographer Dariusz Wolski (one of my faves) shoot the action akin to a first-person video game experience. Add to that a marvelous score by Hays and Ryan Holladay, and some choice character work by Paul Walter Hauser and Zach Cherry, I enjoyed the experience of “Resident Evil” more than I had any right enjoying it.
