My Thoughts on Resident Evil (2002)

[Alucard]

Horribly late, but something about this movie just gets me and I can't quite put my finger on it, because it's a lot of things. These may not be the most organized thoughts ever, but look at the mind they're coming out of. It's not intended to be whiny, it's just a legit "...why?" I know, it's just a movie, and a dumb movie. But hey...

* I realize the franchise is basically Paul WS Anderson's way of trying to make his wifey Milla a star, but why so much muddling of an already "kind of passable" story from the first game, I mean...I consider the mansion they show to be a homage to the first game and all. But we get no mention of any of those characters? Alright, fair enough...

* So the plot is more along the lines of RE:2...kind of. Okay, I can deal with that. Even though the action is in Raccoon City, it still kind of isn't because we spend almost the entire movie in this secret underground facility. ...wat?

* You're asking me to suspend a LOT of disbelief on this underground facility that nobody knows about, judging by staging and various scenes alone, this thing has to be almost as big as the f***ing city itsself. How in the blue hell does nobody outside of Umbrella know about it? How does it not infect the groundwater? I know there are likely cleaning measures but with...eh nevermind. Umbrella is established almost from the get-go as "evil for the sake of being evil". So this big evil underground multi-leveled facility of...um, evil science, has a functional train and whatnot that leads to the mansion they offloaded their Alice project into? Okay. Now you're REALLY asking me to suspend my disbelief. How does some random person not notice the whirring and clatter of a damned train system below their feet? Does Umbrella put "stupid" in the water? I have no idea.

* Michelle Rodriguez is hot. Why does she keep dying in every movie ever? I can count on like one hand the films M-Rod DIDN'T die in. Barring Bloodrayne which I haven't seen as nobody should be subjected to that. Ah well, at least she lasted a long time and wasn't fodder for the inexplicably evil security system.

* WHY IN THE NAME OF GOD WOULD YOU DESIGN A SECURITY SYSTEM TO BE SO MALEVOLENT AND EVIL? THIS IS A SERIOUS OVERSIGHT. THAT'S JUST STUPID. ARGHGH.

* Is it just me, or for some scenes were the "Sanitation" uniforms made of leather? ...okay, I guess it's good to be stylish when dealing with...viral...outbreaks or something?

* The score's okay. I can't complain about that too much. That's coming from a movie score nerd.

* The teasers for Resident Evil: Apocalypse that plugged that "Regenerate" serum. Which was actually T-Virus. Which made people into zombies. Uh. It was a cool ad and all, scared many a moviegoer in the audience. But like, releasing a skin creme product that turns people into zombies is pretty...like, what, were they reading the "Joker guide to marketing a product!: Step 1. Make sure your product secretly does something horrible for no good reason."

* What the hell is Umbrella Corp's motivation in these messes of movies anyhow? They pretty much ruled the economy. They created a deadly bio-weapon. They released it. Uh...so what. Short attention span? They want to rule the world for the specific purpose of destroying it? There's an excellent Cracked article about this that inspired this point which I previously hadn't thought of, but yeah, just what the hell WERE they going for?

* I'd still probably hit it when it comes to zombie Michelle Rodriguez.

* The CGI here is a mixed bag at best.

* That dog-kick stunt that they overplayed the hell out of seriously isn't that impressive looking. Why was that considered so trailerworthy?

* Ah, we finally get to see Raccoon City! Awesome, this is pretty authentic I gue...THE MOVIE IS OVER?

* Well, I don't normally dig on Slipknot, but I don't dislike this song.

I don't...hate this movie. It's one of the more watchable game movies. But there's just so much in it going on that just leaves me scratching my head. It is kind of humorous that after this one...it's allll downhill from here.

[Perpetual Nirvana]

How was the scecurity syestem evil? It was doing what it was prgrammed to do, contain the outbreak.

And the skin cream reanimated dead cells. In effect, it reversed the aging process. Too much turns you into a zombie but that was an unexpected side effect. I think the cosmetics were still in the development process anyway. That's what the bunnies, shown at the beginning, were for.

I can't argue your other points but I kinda liked the film for what it was. The the sequel came along with actual characters form the games who proceeded tio get the shaft in favour of Super Alice. That I can't support.

[Alucard]

Nov 30, 2010 20:28:28 GMT -5 Perpetual Nirvana said:

How was the scecurity syestem evil? It was doing what it was prgrammed to do, contain the outbreak.

And the skin cream reanimated dead cells. In effect, it reversed the aging process. Too much turns you into a zombie but that was an unexpected side effect. I think the cosmetics were still in the development process anyway. That's what the bunnies, shown at the beginning, were for.

I can't argue your other points but I kinda liked the film for what it was. The the sequel came along with actual characters form the games who proceeded tio get the shaft in favour of Super Alice. That I can't support.

I guess by "the security system was evil" I mean..."it killed the bejezus out of that team like whoa", and it's sentience just seemed...a bad idea.

I more than likely won't have all my facts straight (and I'll admit that outright), and yeah, I do kinda remember that, that it regenerates dead skin cells. But that seems an awfully big risk to just take on a whim, y'know? Then again...it's the movie Umbrella Corp. Who are just...doin' stuff.

[Perpetual Nirvana]

Nov 30, 2010 20:30:36 GMT -5 Alucard said:

Nov 30, 2010 20:28:28 GMT -5 Perpetual Nirvana said:

How was the scecurity syestem evil? It was doing what it was prgrammed to do, contain the outbreak.

And the skin cream reanimated dead cells. In effect, it reversed the aging process. Too much turns you into a zombie but that was an unexpected side effect. I think the cosmetics were still in the development process anyway. That's what the bunnies, shown at the beginning, were for.

I can't argue your other points but I kinda liked the film for what it was. The the sequel came along with actual characters form the games who proceeded tio get the shaft in favour of Super Alice. That I can't support.

I guess by "the security system was evil" I mean..."it killed the bejezus out of that team like whoa", and it's sentience just seemed...a bad idea.

You mean the corridor with the laser grid? That was a defense mechanism activated to protect the computer core in times of crisis. At least I think it was. Haven't watched the film for ages and I don't feel like digging out the DVD. In any case, the computer hacker guy tried to shut it off but he didn't get all the failsafes. Or something. Like I said, while since I've seen it.

I more than likely won't have all my facts straight (and I'll admit that outright), and yeah, I do kinda remember that, that it regenerates dead skin cells. But that seems an awfully big risk to just take on a whim, y'know? Then again...it's the movie Umbrella Corp. Who are just...doin' stuff.

Like I said, it still seemed like they were at the testing stage what with the shots of them injecting it into rabbits and all.

[Alucard]

Nov 30, 2010 20:47:43 GMT -5 Perpetual Nirvana said:

Nov 30, 2010 20:30:36 GMT -5 Alucard said:

I guess by "the security system was evil" I mean..."it killed the bejezus out of that team like whoa", and it's sentience just seemed...a bad idea.

You mean the corridor with the laser grid? That was a defense mechanism activated to protect the computer core in times of crisis. At least I think it was. Haven't watched the film for ages and I don't feel like digging out the DVD. In any case, the computer hacker guy tried to shut it off but he didn't get all the failsafes. Or something. Like I said, while since I've seen it.

I more than likely won't have all my facts straight (and I'll admit that outright), and yeah, I do kinda remember that, that it regenerates dead skin cells. But that seems an awfully big risk to just take on a whim, y'know? Then again...it's the movie Umbrella Corp. Who are just...doin' stuff.

Like I said, it still seemed like they were at the testing stage what with the shots of them injecting it into rabbits and all.

That's kind of what I'm alluding to like, okay...did they test it on the rabbits and everything was cool, or did they make fleshhungry zombie rabbits (which may as well had been in the movie), or did they just kinda go "okay, no need to test on humans!" and released it as-is. Or did they know exactly what they were doing? With Umbrella's track record, it's kinda hard to call it.

[Perpetual Nirvana]

Nov 30, 2010 20:53:47 GMT -5 Alucard said:

Nov 30, 2010 20:47:43 GMT -5 Perpetual Nirvana said:

You mean the corridor with the laser grid? That was a defense mechanism activated to protect the computer core in times of crisis. At least I think it was. Haven't watched the film for ages and I don't feel like digging out the DVD. In any case, the computer hacker guy tried to shut it off but he didn't get all the failsafes. Or something. Like I said, while since I've seen it.



Like I said, it still seemed like they were at the testing stage what with the shots of them injecting it into rabbits and all.

That's kind of what I'm alluding to like, okay...did they test it on the rabbits and everything was cool, or did they make fleshhungry zombie rabbits (which may as well had been in the movie), or did they just kinda go "okay, no need to test on humans!" and released it as-is. Or did they know exactly what they were doing? With Umbrella's track record, it's kinda hard to call it.

Who says it was released at all? Who's to say they weren't still working the bugs out. That's what I'm saying. I really doubt the commercials are "canon". Unless they were actually in the film somewhere and I forgot about it.

[Alucard]

Nov 30, 2010 20:57:12 GMT -5 Perpetual Nirvana said:

Nov 30, 2010 20:53:47 GMT -5 Alucard said:

That's kind of what I'm alluding to like, okay...did they test it on the rabbits and everything was cool, or did they make fleshhungry zombie rabbits (which may as well had been in the movie), or did they just kinda go "okay, no need to test on humans!" and released it as-is. Or did they know exactly what they were doing? With Umbrella's track record, it's kinda hard to call it.

Who says it was released at all? Who's to say they weren't still working the bugs out. That's what I'm saying. I really doubt the commercials are "canon". Unless they were actually in the film somewhere and I forgot about it.

True enough.

[Koda, Master Crunchyroller]

In the films, the T-Virus didn't just work on dead skin cells, it worked on all kinds of dead cells. The guy who created the virus in the film series' universe did it so his daughter could walk again, and she had the virus constantly regulated, kinda like Wesker in RE5 regulated the virus in himself.

Also, at first Anderson didn't do the films to make his wife look awesome, because Milia wasn't his wife when they made they first film. She definitely was when they made the second film, though, and if you notice, the second film was when she was first Sued up as all hell. In the first film, she was kinda believable, she had the combat training one would expect her profession would entitle, and she was good with a gun, but that's it. She didn't have the psychic powers or other bullshit till the second film.

I did find it kinda odd that the ONE "experiment" creature they took from the games for the first film was the Licker, not a Tyrant, hell not even a Hunter, but a Licker. It wasn't a bad choice, and kinda made the most sense. Hell, it was the only one they could realistically kill, in terms of keeping to the games, with the weapon loadouts they had when they faced it(ie, just handguns). In the games, you can kill Tyrant with a pistol, but you need a crap load of ammo, something they didn't have. You can't kill a Hunter with a pistol, it needs to be a strong gun, like the Magnum, grenade launcher, or rocket launcher.

[Alucard]

...fair enough.

I always lapse a lot of stuff that was...quite honestly with the way the film was presented (not ragging on it), it's easy to miss things.

So I ask (I've been having cram sessions for school since my last viewing):

What IS Alice in the first one? I know they built some elaborate ruse around her, and I know she had some sort of training, but is that ever clearly noted?

[Perpetual Nirvana]

Nov 30, 2010 21:09:24 GMT -5 Alucard said:

What IS Alice in the first one? I know they built some elaborate ruse around her, and I know she had some sort of training, but is that ever clearly noted?

IIRC, all they say is that she and the guy who's supposed to be her husband (I can't remember names at all) are security operatives put in place to protect the entrance to the Hive.

And Koda, Milia wasn't his wife but they were dating at the time. Which is why the shot near the end where she falls off the table and you get a clear look at her cooch is kinda disturbing.

[Koda, Master Crunchyroller]

Nov 30, 2010 22:22:30 GMT -5 devondragon said:

I don't recall them even saying Alice's name in the movie

I think she remembered her name when she remembered everything at the climax of the film.

[darthalexander]

I really don't mind these movies. I was never a fan of the games (until RE 4 that is) so I was ok with the movies as they were. I'm also a sucker for zombie flicks so I'm not the best person to ask about this.

[Jiren]

From what I've heard Anderson's "Resi movie" was in fact a Zombie movie he wrote a good while back but added elements (Well names anyway) of the game to make it sell.

[Totorob101]

I hated it a lot.Really and Nemesis was made to look like a weak pathetic joke in the second film which ill never forgive them for.

[i.Sarita.com]

I was a huge fan of the games...so naturally I was let down by the first movie. But watching it again, now, I don't think it's too bad of a movie.

And the second one was just awful. Bad enough to make me not want to bother seeing any of the others since.

[bob]

I like it, but I've never played the game so I don't know how good/bad the adaptation was but I'm guessing horrible as is usually the case when people try to make movies based off video games

[mysterydriver]

I always wondered why the laser security didn't start with the grid.

Makes the other forms seem like a waste of laser....

[Alucard]

Dec 1, 2010 8:54:18 GMT -5 mysterydriver said:

I always wondered why the laser security didn't start with the grid.

Makes the other forms seem like a waste of laser....

This is also a good point.