Resident Evil 4: Afterlife

The venerable Resident Evil series has spawned three fairly good movies of zombie-blasting fun. The fourth in the series is in 3D and filmed with the same camera system as James Cameron's Avatar. The opening scenes recap the events of the past three films and culminates in where Alice (Milla Jovovich) left off in the last film with an attack on the headquarters of Umbrella Corporation in Japan by Alice's clones. A lone clone begins with a now-common hallway gauntlet attack. The attack is successful although the leader Albert Wesker (Shawn Roberts) manages to escape and destroys the facility. He is surprised to find the original Alice on his getaway plane (a cool-looking VTOL craft). Before she can kill him however, he injects her with a serum which neutralises the T-virus in her and strips her of her special abilities (damn!). While lording it over her, Wesker foolishly neglects to steer the plane and they go ka-boom. Alice miraculously survives and goes on to find other survivors while heading to the promised land of Arcadia where there is supposedly food, shelter, and no infection.

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When Alice gets to the supposed co-ordinates of Arcadia, she finds only a graveyard of planes and conveniently meets up with Claire Redfield (Ali Larter of Heroes) who is under the influence of a memory-erasing bug-like device on her chest. Alice manages to knock her out and remove the device and they go on their way looking for survivors. They end up in Los Angeles (I think) where they find a group of survivors holed-up in a huge prison building surrounded by a sea of zombies. The group has a politically-correct mix of a Hispanic guy, an African-American guy, a Korean guy, and a couple of Caucasians. Then there's a lone prisoner who claims to be a soldier. He turns out to be Chris Redfield (Wentworth Miller of Prison Break, amusingly in prison again), Claire's brother.

The group hatch a plan to escape to Arcadia using a huge tank-like machine conveniently left behind. Unfortunately we never get to see the thing in action. The plan is complicated by the fact that the zombies have burrowed into the prison and the arrival of the Axeman (Ray Olubowale), a gigantic zombie wearing a sack as a hood, brimming with spikes and hooks, and carrying a HUGE axe/hammer (where the heck did he get that thing??) which he uses to break down the prison gates.

The group eventually escapes, losing some members along the way, and find their way to Arcadia (which turns out to be a ship). They find the ship abandoned but filled with survivors in stasis chambers. They also find Wesker who has apparently been sitting there waiting for Alice for the past six months. Bloody battles ensue and there's an additional scene during the credits which sets up the scene for the next installment (Umbrella just can't be stopped no matter how many times you destroy them).

I was looking forward to seeing many gimmicky 3D effects in this movie and I have to say I was mildly disappointed. The effects were not as in-your-face as I would have liked. The stunts and battles were well done and very cool to watch, though. The visual effects, while relatively subtle, were suitably creepy and realistic and the 3D effect was subtly present throughout. The girls looked real good and were great to watch kicking zombie butt. I'm wondering how in this post-apocalyptic world, they still have the time and will to wear make-up and lipstick. Alice also appears to be wearing designer clothes. I guess a girl still has to look good even if zombies rule the world.

All in all, the film offers everything you'd expect from it and I look forward to the next one.

Braaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnsssssss.....!