Mulberry Street.

Part of the 2007 “After Dark Horrorfest” releases, “Mulberry Street” is apparently a fresh take on the zombie sub-genre.  According to the box.  From the description, it sounds like "C.H.U.D." meets ZOMBIES meets whatever.  The director, Jim Mickle, later went on to write and direct “Stake Land”, which was generally well liked and well received by critics… so that’s promising.  After about seven million previews, we eventually make it to the DVD menu in one piece and I start this sucker.  The film begins with main character, Clutch, jogging around NYC at dawn.  We get glimpses of billboards for some big, likely evil, corporation called CROME, hear talk about protestors in the city, and get some obvious foreshadowing of what’s to come when they show huge inflatable rats.

[...]

[We are introduced to some people in Clutch’s apartment building, as well as to his soldier daughter who is coming home... from the war?  Wheelchair Guy, who lives in Clutch's building is to be evicted by the owners of the building, the CROME Corporation...]

Lovelock: What… a… DUMP!  I’d be happy to let the CROME Corporation evict me.

[Also, we see a dead girl in a dumpster outside, bitten to death by rats.  Then Dead Dumpster Girl, back from the dead,  kills wheelchair guy… inside the apartment building... I think.]

Starkwell: So… Dead Girl from dumpster kills Wheelchair Guy?

Lovelock: I think…

[...]

The Super of the building picks up a seemingly dead rat.  It bites him.  He throws it to the ground and steps on it.  Lovelock then did a jump kick, overly excited for the promise of rat zombies.  Then the news starts showing reports of rat attacks all across the city which only furthered his desire to perform jump kicks.  Lovelock and Starkwell didn’t have much to say.  They were genuinely interested in the story, the characters, and the direction that the film was heading in.

[...]

[The Super starts growing hair in weird places.]

Lovelock: Isn’t he a little old for puberty… oh wait.

[...]

[The rat attacks happening in the subway systems are on the rise.  The entire subway system is shut down.  The city is in a state of emergency.]

Lovelock: See!?!?  If it can happen with rats, it could TOTALLY happen with birds.  Irrational fear of birds has been validated.

Starkwell: You realize this is a movie, right?

Lovelock: Validated.

[...]

Soldier Girl is just trying to get home to see her dad.  She doesn’t really know what’s going on, but there are some genuinely creepy shots of her walking around a deserted park.  Then she picked up an abandoned bicycle and started biking the city.  Starkwell was impressed, he felt tense.  Lovelock was waiting for all Hell to break loose.

[...]

[Drunk people sexing in a bar bathroom are eaten by a rat zombie… woman?]

Lovelock: And that’s why I never have sex in a bar bathroom.

Starkwell: Yeah, that’s why.

Lovelock: Well, that and herpes.  The ol' herps.

[...]

Then all Hell officially breaks loose.  As the bar owner kills rat zombies with a frying pan, Lovelock played air guitar and made up a song about rat zombies.  I think he rhymed “eating dudes” and “woman foods” at one point, if that makes ANY sense.  STarkwell, always concerned about continuity, was wondering why the bar people turned rat zombie so quickly, whereas the Super at the apartment, as well as Wheelchair Guy, seem to take a while.

[...]

[Soldier Girl, still biking, bikes by people being eaten by rat zombies.]

Lovelock: I fucking hate bikers in the city.

Starkwell: Can’t you make an exception here? … I mean, there are no cars… everyone is being eaten.  Rat zombies patrol the city...

Lovelock: Watch, now I bet she’ll do one of those stupid arm signals.  YEAH WE SEE YOU, get off the road!

[...]

Soldier Girl is still traveling the city, trying to get to her dad.  Now she has a pickup truck.  Meanwhile Clutch goes to rescue his next door neighbor.  Somewhere in the chaos, Clutch put his fist through a rat zombie’s head.  Lovelock let out a very loud "SHABLAMMO", whatever that means.  Then, quite unexpectedly, Clutch and Neighbor Woman run into Soldier Girl and the Neighbor Woman is eaten immediately.  Whatever Lovelock said at that point was incomprehensible.  It was a mixture of shock, happiness, nervousness and a fart.  It was no shablammo.  As the surviving members of the shithole apartment bunker down into two of the apartments, Starkwell and Lovelock looked visibly STRESSED OUT.

[...]

[Basically everyone except Clutch and his daughter are eaten by rat zombies.]

Starkwell: Holy shit dude.

Lovelock: WAAaaaaaaaaaah...

[...]

[Right around dawn, a bunch of dudes in HASMAT suits storm the city, armed with… flashlights ?  Flashlight guns?  Clutch dies.  I think HASMATs kill the daughter.]

Starkwell: Wait… bright flashes of light hurt them?  But then wouldn’t the sun have just taken care of them?  Why bother with that if everyone’s dead anyways?

Lovelock: I’m still trying to figure out if they were implying that Clutch and the other guy were gay…

Starkwell: Wait, so was it the CROME Corporation?

Lovelock: Wait, is Soldier Girl dead... wait why?

[...]

There was definite confusion at the end (and throughout much of the film), but a great flick nonetheless.  Fresh take?  Not so much, though.

The Face of Marble.

Known in the industry as William “One-Shot” Beaudine, Starkwell and Lovelock know him from their encounter with his earlier moving picture “The Living Ghost”.  Since that was hardly a pleasant experience, Starkwell already has said “let’s see if he’s William ‘One-Shit’ Beaudine, or if indeed, he took many shits and called it cinema.  William "One-Shot / Many-Shits" Beaudine.”  Off to a good start.  Lovelock thinks maybe John Carradine can help this one suck less.  This was filmed sometime in the 1940s, likely in a day, after Beaudine had the opportunity to make a movie centered on Bela Lugosi in a gorilla suit, but long before he shot episodes of "Lassie".  Exactly.

[...]

[African American Butler(?) comes to inform Woman of the House, Elaine, of some strange things going down.]

Starkwell: The year was 1946, and racism was alive and well on the big screen.

Lovelock: Did she just say “let the boy speak”?

Starkwell: I feel really uncomfortable.

[...]

The quality of the print was worse than atrocious.  The dialogue was muddled and gross sounding and, for some reason, the image on the screen was shaking continuously.  It would be interesting to imagine that this was done on purpose back in the 40s, but clearly it’s just a shitty copy of a film that likely barely exists anymore.

[...]

[Woman interrupts the Men Doctors doing science.]

Starkwell: Clearly, science is a man’s world!

Lovelock: Did he just tell her to “leave us, like a 'good girl'”?

Starkwell: I feel really uncomfortable.

[...]

Turns out the two Doctors stole a dead body off the beach from a shipwreck.  They’re seemingly only SLIGHTLY worried whether or not the authorities will be upset that they STOLE A DEAD MAN.  But then they revive said dead guy momentarily, and claim that he has a “face of marble”.  Then he re-dies, and the doctor says “he’s dead, QUITE dead.”  Lovelock and Starkwell laughed hysterically.

[...]

[Scientists talk about ‘Maria the Help’ and her “crazy jungle mumbo jumbo”.]

Starkwell: I repeat. I feel really uncomfortable.

[...]

It’s clear that Woman actually is in love with Young Doctor David, instead of her husband, Older Doctor Charles.  Maria the Help has been putting Voodoo Dolls under David’s pillow, trying to curse him into loving Elaine… I think.

[...]

[David drops Voodoo Doll into acid, Maria the Help faints and falls down the stairs.]

Lovelock: BEST. STUNT. EVER.

Starkwell: I wonder how much they paid that old woman for that…

Lovelock: Not enough.

Starkwell: Thankfully he’s William “One-Shot” Beaudine, otherwise Maria the Actress would be dead.

[...]

[Dr. Charles killed the dog Brutus, in order to try to revive him.]

Starkwell: WHY in the FUCK would he KILL THE DOG?!?!?!

Lovelock: “Now now, I could try a mouse, or a rat, or, Hell, even a raccoon from the yard, but no, doggone it, let’s try with my wife’s beloved dog.  It worked so well on that sailor yesterday… oh… wait… oops.”

[It doesn’t work… or does it?  They suddenly hear Brutus barking.]

Lovelock: Might be the earliest incarnation of the zombie dog.

Starkwell: He seems mean as Hell.

[Dr. Charles shoots the zombie dog, but he doesn’t die!  Then he JUMPS THROUGH THE WINDOW WITHOUT BREAKING IT, like a ghost.]

Starkwell: A couple of things… why would he have a gun?  Also... walking through walls?

Lovelock: So… super powered zombie dog?  He isn’t harmed by bullets and can traverse through walls.  Eat that, “Resident Evil” dogs.  Also, eat that, “Kitty Pride”.

[...]

[Elaine gives Dr. David a huge wet kiss for his birthday, but then his fiancée shows up, and then Elaine gets all sour and bitchy.]

Starkwell: Awkward.

Lovelock: So, Elaine is a bit of a whore… Am I right, guys?

[...]

The cop informs us that it turns out the zombie dog has been killing farm animals by biting their throats and draining their blood.  I believe Lovelock’s reaction was “fucking amazing. Walks through walls, can’t die, bloodsucker.  Best dog of all time.  Scooby-Doo?  You know what, fuck Scooby-Doo.”

[...]

[Maria the Help tries to kill Fiancée, but ends up killing Elaine instead.]

Starkwell: I love how they aren’t even curious about who killed her.

Lovelock: Hey, all that matters is that now they have a new dog and/or woman to try their SCIENCE on.

Starkwell: Seriously.  Why aren’t they like “HEY WHO KILLED ELAINE”?

Lovelock: When life hands these guys lemons, they make zombie dogs.

[...]

Eventually they revive Elaine, and, obviously, she has THE FACE OF MARBLE just like the dead sailor.  "Whatever that means", says Lovelock.  What makes no sense to Starkwell or Lovelock is why they thought it would work at all.  They haven’t changed anything about their formula.  Two days ago they failed to revive a sailor, then they turned a dog into a zombie bloodsucker, now they think WITHOUT CHANGING THEIR FORMULA, that the results will change.

[...]

Starkwell: They are the worst scientists ever.

Lovelock: Says you… ZOMBIE DOG for the win.

Starkwell: I don’t feel like I’ve won.

[...]

[Zombie Elaine and Zombie Brutus, apparently now under Maria the Help’s control kill Dr. Charles… by stabbing him in the back.]

Lovelock: Ummm… I was lead to believe that there would be throat tearing and blood sucking…

Starkwell: Wait… so was it the experiment that revived her or voodoo?  What about Brutus?  This is all a real mess…

Lovelock: I feel cheated.  I want my Zombie Dog action.  Fuck you, Beaudine.

[...]

What pisses Starkwell off even more is that Elaine wakes up and seems perfectly normal the next day.  So the experiment doesn’t work, then it does on a dog, but turns him into a killer, but then it works on Elaine when combined with Voodoo, but she's being controlled by Maria, but then all of a sudden, so is the dog?  Garbage.  After a HILARIOUS scene where David punches a cop, eventually the Starkwell/Lovelock laughter died down, only for them to realize that the movie had ended.  Apparently Maria killed herself and Zombie Elaine and Zombie Brutus walked into the ocean.  Yes, for real.  Considering that "Face of Marble" was just something that Dr. David said a couple of times, but had absolutely nothing to do with anything, it seems like an odd choice for the film title.  But then again, Ol' Billy "One-Shot" likely wasn't known for making good choices.  Or ones that made any sense.

Demoniacs.

There’s not a whole lot I can do for Starkwell and Lovelock to help them prepare for a Jean Rollin film.  They already know to expect a slow pace, a heavy dose of weirdness, and, obviously, many tits.  Will this one exceed their expectations?  Meet expectations?  Only deliver the aforementioned tits?  Who knows?  Well, they will soon.  As is the case with all releases from “REDEMPTION”, before the film even starts, we are presented with an opening of a naked gigantic fake boobied woman, covered in blood and being bitten by what we can only assume is a vampire lesbian of some kind.  It always succeeds in setting the bar so high.

[...]

[We are introduced to some pirates...  We get a headshot of all of them, one at a time.]

Lovelock: It’s like the Brady Bunch!

Starkwell: Except that they, you know, rape and kill people.

Lovelock: A minor difference.

[...]

[The pirates look around the dark beach with lanterns, for several minutes.]

Starkwell: Sooo… I guess we’re trying to establish that it’s dark… and they need lanterns.

Lovelock: Hey, Rollin… we get it.

[...]

Then they found a treasure chest, slowly examined a necklace, which the captain gave to his wench, the female pirate.  Then he felt her breasts for a while.

[...]

[Two of the pirates find two confused women walking the beach in night gowns.]

Starkwell: What’s a Rollin film without a long, drawn out, awkward, uncomfortable rape sequence?

Lovelock: Is the answer “a better movie”?

Starkwell: Obviously while the two pirates rape and kill the Night Gown Girls, the Captain’s Wench dances naked on a rock.

[Then the Captain gets naked and they bone on that very rock.]

Starkwell: Good luck with this one.

[Starkwell leaves.]

[...]

Seriously, it takes like TEN MINUTES before the pirates finally just finish killing the Night Gown Girls.  In that time, we got to see naked Captain ass, and a bunch of simulated sex and/or rape.

[...]

Lovelock: Jesus Christ, I hope it was simulated.

[...]

It immediately cuts to a bar, the Captain is hungover, and a bunch of pirates are hanging out doing what pirates do, you know, licking exposed female nipples and dancing to lame accordion music.  Starkwell came back, because he wanted to know what Lovelock was laughing so hard about.  He decided to stay.

[...]

[The Captain sees apparitions of the Night Gown Girls as they apparently haunt him in the bar.]

Lovelock: That’s why I never drink.

Starkwell: Yeah, that’s why.

Lovelock: Well, that and the calories.

[...]

[Blood drips from above onto the Captain’s hands.]

Lovelock: Why would the Night Gown Girls pour tomato juice onto the… oh wait… I see what that was supposed to look like.

Starkwell: Sharp.

[...]

The woman who runs the brothel seems to know about all sots of crazy mythology about the surrounding islands… also, for some reason, seems to have authority over the Captain.  Then the Captain FLIPS OUT and gets in a knife fight with another pirate… Starkwell and Lovelock laughed so hard that they actually started having trouble breathing.

[...]

Lovelock: Is that a sculpture of a naked woman with her legs spread hanging on the wall?  The boobs are all crooked and the artist made the vagina HUGE.  It's absolutely frightening.

Starkwell: Obviously, the bar fight was broken up by the Queen of the Brothel playing piano and singing nautical songs.

Lovelock: What year is this supposed to be, because that dude’s bell bottoms are out of this world, and seemingly quite advanced for this era of pirates?

[...]

As is the norm with much of what they have seen of Rollin's films, Starkwell had to at least commend him on the locations he used.  “The shipyard is magnificent”, says Starkwell.  But then, without skipping a beat adding in a “too bad it doesn’t help speed this shit up to at least a 'molasses' pace.”

[...]

[The pirates go back to finish off the Night Gown Girls.]

Starkwell: Wait, they aren’t dead?

Lovelock: Considering all that they’ve been through, their white gowns are surprisingly clean.

Starkwell: They just don’t make night gowns like they used to.

[Captain’s Wench fights the Night Gown Girls.  Loses.]

Starkwell: Obviously her boobs come out of her shirt.

[...]

Shit stops making sense around this point.  Wench is hurt, and then she isn’t.  She’s yelling, but then she’s passed out.  Captain is carrying her at night, and then suddenly she is chasing the Night Gown Girls in daylight.  It is a hot mess.

[...]

Starkwell: Obviously she is in the water, and her boobs are out of her shirt.

Lovelock: Look at those things… could you keep them in a shirt?

[...]

The Night Gown Girls are suddenly in a courtyard and there is a woman in clown makeup with a red afro prancing around.  She leads them somewhere.  It takes a good few minutes to get there.  We get to see all of these 'few minutes'.  It’s around this point that none of us understood what the hell was going on anymore.  I’d say something is being lost in translation, but we all speak French.  I guess we don’t speak Rollin.

[...]

[Night Gown Girls get a change of clothes.  Shorter Night Gowns.]

Starkwell: Were they not offered pants?

Lovelock: The actresses?  By Rollin? Probably not.

Starkwell: Well, I meant the characters, but, yeah… good point.

[...]

Then there was a scene where the Wench played with her breasts while the Captain cuddled and kissed a stuffed and mounted seagull sitting next to him on the desk.  He ripped the head off of the seagull, wrestled the now completely naked and screaming Wench, and then, they had sex.  Starkwell just left again.  It has been one hour and nothing has happened.  Unless, of course, you count Starkwell leaving the room twice.  Also, many sexy stuffs which, unfortunately, has not been sexy.

[...]

[Night Gown Girls get naked and walk towards the cell holding some dude.  Is it Satan?  Let's call him Mystery Man.  They are apparently going to trade their souls for super powers... I think...]

Lovelock: You would think it would be difficult to make naked women THIS boring.  But, alas, here we are.

[...]

Lovelock: In an ideal world, Paul Naschy would play half of the characters in this movie.  Also, the movie would only be twenty minutes long.

[...]

Lovelock: I wonder if in the script, it says stuff like “Character walks three feet, this should take roughly seventeen minutes.”

Starkwell: “Mystery Man has sex with each Night Gown Girl.  Show small amounts of Mystery Man’s limp side peen.”

Lovelock: You’re back?

Starkwell: A thousand times no.  But, I forgot my phone.  Later.

[...]

So, yeah, after the girls have the orgasm they are now SUPER POWERED WITH DEVIL JUICE and out for revenge.  Maybe now something will happen.  Good thing there is only twenty minutes left and it took seventy minutes to get here.

[...]

[Night Gown Girls show up in the bar and have a staring contest with the pirates.]

Lovelock: Oh for the love of shitballs, can something please just fucking happen?!??!?! Make Bosco’s head explode! Hammer someone’s face! Make the Captain melt!  SOMETHING!

[...]

[The Night Gown Girls make statues fall towards Wench in the courtyard.]

Lovelock: Totally where Lucas got the idea for the force.

[Starkwell wasn’t around to call him an idiot.]

[...]

Then the Wench was sort of crushed by a Jesus statue, but then like, was breathing heavily, then the clown was back and she was dying for some reason, and the Gown Girls started washing her makeup off, and then like random Priest dude is dead and Mystery Man is there and lost his power? Wench is alive?  I think… Fuck… I give up.

[...]

Lovelock: You wouldn’t think someone could confuse an audience so much by having so little happen.  But, alas, here we are.

[...]

Lovelock’s favorite part came near the end, when a drunken pirate tripped on the beach, landed head first into a gigantic empty bottle of alcohol he was carrying, and immediately died.  I think it was just refreshing to see something happen fast, instead of, as Lovelock put it, “PAINFULLY FOREVER SLOW”, which perfectly describes the entire movie.  Anyways, in the end, the Night Gown Girls still end up dying.  But not before Rollin shows the pirates raping them one last time.  And then Captain is possessed and kills everyone?  I think.

[...]

Lovelock: So essentially, the super powers that Mystery Man gave them, was ability to move a few statues, kind of survive ONE stabbing, and then, basically die.

Starkwell: You forgot BORING THE AUDIENCE.

Lovelock: Oh also... SUCKING!

Starkwell: Double Entendre for the win.

[Now they both left.]

[...]

I mean, what good movie DOESN’T END with a parade of random monks whom we have never seen before, followed by five whole minutes of the tide rising over a naked dead woman?  All of them you say?  You’d be right.  In conclusion, Rollin probably really drown that woman.

Resident Evil: Afterlife.

The fourth instalment of the series finds Paul Anderson taking the helm once again as director.  Considering the first film was the only other film that he directed, and it was Starkwell and Lovelock’s LEAST favorite, he certainly has his work cut out for him to get them back on team Anderson.  Granted, even if the story and character development suffer, he can always just launch loads of confused and naked Milla scenes at the audience in a desperate attempt to win them over.  Usually successfully.  I’ve made a point to tell Starkwell and Lovelock that I had them watch all of the “Resident Evil” movies in one week because, in fact, this is not the last film in the series and that the new one JUST CAME OUT IN THEATRES, IN 3D!!!  But then I immediately pulled the rug out from under them and told them that I had no intention to treat them to a night at the theater, so they’d have to wait for a DVD release.  I think I referred to them as “bitches” at one point.  Like “you bitches are gonna have to wait for the DVD, and that shit won’t be in 3D, and you won’t get no damn cool glasses”.  I like keeping their spirits down.  Usually I do that by showing them horrible movies.  This was just more fun.  Ok, let’s get all ‘Afterlifey’ in this mofo.

[...]

[Intro is slow motion Japanese people walking with umbrellas in the rain.  One girl has no umbrella.]

Starkwell: In a land of Umbrellas, one girl stands alone.

[Umbrella-less girl goes zombie and eats a guy.]

Lovelock: You were giving Anderson way too much poetic credit there.

[...]

After a very brief recap, the secret Tokyo Umbrella lab is invaded by a super powered ninja Alice.  Who then gets shot and killed… but then…

[...]

[There are a whole shitload of Super Powered Ninja Alices storming the place.]

Starkwell: I don’t know if it’s specifically because of Captain Sunglasses, or just the way that this is all going down, with all of the slo-mo and martial arty action, but I can’t help but feel like I’m watching a remake of “The Matrix” starring Milla Jovovich.

Lovelock: I think that’s not even the same actor playing Captain Sunglasses… or at least he sounds different.  I can’t quite put my finger on it…

Starkwell: Agent Smith, he's trying to sound like Agent Smith.

Lovelock: At least Anderson knows his audience... I guess...

[...]

Then Alice is made human again… and yet SOMEHOW she immediately survives a plane crash that exploded like the Deth Starr.  Lovelock started laughing, but Starkwell was being a real sourpuss.  I guess he really prefers films without GINORMOUS plot holes.

[...]

[Alice lands in Alaska, flying some kind of old World War II plane.]

Starkwell: Alice is… THE RED BARON.

[...]

Alice finds Claire, but she was being controlled by some kind of Umbrella Remote Control thing.  Once the thing is destroyed, she doesn’t remember Alice.  Eventually Claire remembers everything.  Seriously, having her memory be temporarily lost served no purpose.  So they go looking for the rest of their crew, trying to piece together what happened in Alaska.  Then they land on a building in Los Angeles, right as they run out of gas.

[...]

[Umbrella can hear everything that Alice says.]

Starkwell: How can Alice be that dumb?  She knows they are monitoring her every move...

Lovelock: Well, someone who wakes up naked and confused as often as she does can’t possibly be the sharpest tool in the shed.

Starkwell: Hey… good point, no Nude Milla yet.

Lovelock: Well, this was the first of the series made AFTER they got married… maybe Anderson suddenly didn’t like EVERYONE seeing his wife naked, wet and confused.

[...]

[Chris, played by Wentworth Miller, is locked in the Building Gang’s holding cell.]

Lovelock: Pffff… like that little cage can hold Michael Scofield.

[...]

[Alice shows off her knives and guns and coin collection.]

Starkwell: Of course she collects coins.

[...]

[The Building Gang still has running water, Alice is about to strip and take a shower, but is interrupted by mutant zombies.]

Lovelock: Oh COME ON!!!  Now he’s just teasing us!  It’s like he’s TRYING to remind us that there is no naked, wet and confused Milla in this one.

[...]

Anyways, the action pressed on, as the Building Gang tried to find a way out of there.  As usual, Anderson has no trouble killing people off as quickly as he introduces them.  The action scenes are pretty over the top and cheesy, but what else could you expect?

[...]

[Alice flies off the roof, swinging on a cable and mows down zombies in mid-air, to a techno soundtrack.]

Lovelock: BAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!

[...]

[Super zombie fights Alice and Claire with some sort of super hammer.]

Starkwell: Where does a zombie get a hammer like that?

Lovelock: I assume the same place Alice got her ‘Red Baron’ plane.

Starkwell: And how would he learn to use it?

Lovelock: Probably at the same school that taught Alice how to jump kick dogs.

[...]

Alice, Chris and Claire are the only ones to survive and they eventually make it to the Arcadia, a ship sitting just off the coast of L.A.

[...]

[The Arcadia is some sort of SECRET UMBRELLA LAB.]

Starkwell: How many secret labs can one company possibly have?  Every time Alice destroys one and is all “that’s the last of them” it’s all “aw hell no it ain’t”… getting A LITTLE OLD.

Lovelock: You’re getting a little old.

[...]

Captain Sunglasses is still alive, and acting all Agent Smithy.  He has zombie dogs that look like they’re from “The Thing”.  Anyways, they fight and eventually it’s the end and it’s happy, OR IS IT!?!?! OBVIOUSLY NOT and so everything is set up for another film.  And there are twists!!  It’s clear that the next film will start with INSTANT EXPLOSIONS OF ACTION.  Starkwell and Lovelock did enjoy this one, but are now even more disappointed about the fact that they can’t see what happens next.  That mixed with Lovelock’s disappointment that we were not treated with a naked and confused Milla has created a grim atmosphere here in the TV room.  Spirits are low.  Good.  They were getting a little too comfortable.

Resident Evil: Extinction.

Will all the characers be back, or will they have randomly and inexplicably disappeared?  What will happen with puppet Alice?  How often will Milla Jovovich end up confused and naked, and often times, soaking wet?  Starkwell and Lovelock sit patiently, prepared to do the research necessary to answer these questions and many more, and likely make all sorts of jokes in between.  Let’s see what happens as they see what happens as the DVD explodes into the DVD player and onto the screen.  Like Apocalypse, this was written but not directed by Anderson.  This time, Russell Mulcahy takes the reigns.  He is known, by me, as the dude that directed “Highlander”.  Ready, set, EXTINCTION.

[...]

Lovelock: There can be only one!

Starkwell: …

Lovelock: Last time, I promise.

[...]

[Opens with same sequence from the first film of… Milla Jovovich, naked and confused.]

Lovelock: I prefer all new naked and confused footage, but I suppose this counts.

[...]

[Scientists dump dead Alice into a pile of dead Alices.]

Lovelock: What the-

[...]

Then the film explained how the virus was not wiped out when they bombed Racoon City.  The whole world is over run with zombies.  This is all it took for Lovelock to simultaneously cry tears of joy, high five Starkwell and do a roundhouse jump kick while playing air guitar.  He was so into his playing that he missed a scene of Alice killing some drifters that ambushed her.

[...]

[Pimp and Carlos are back.  Jill is nowhere to be found.  None of them are traveling with Alice…]

Lovelock: Awwww… but whose gun handling will we be able to make fun of?

Starkwell: Don’t worry.  Ali Larter will probably fill in nicely.

Lovelock: I’m just happy that George Harrison Guy is back.

Starkwell: No.  No more, dude.  That actor is ISRAELI… you’re an idiot.

[...]

[Then there was a secret meeting with Umbrella corporation people where the head of the table was a dude in shades.  And he is a hologram.]

Starkwell: Why would a holographic image need sunglasses?  In an underground facility no less...

Lovelock: Maybe it’s sunny where he’s sitting?

Starkwell: Maybe he’s sitting in the Matrix.

[...]

Then there was a scene that pretty much rips off Romero’s “Day of the Dead”.  Maybe he was aiming for HOMAGE.  Anyways, overall, the film is pretty entertaining.  Starkwell and Lovelock watched pretty closely.  It still has its cheesy moments, but is definitely not TRYING as hard as "Apocalypse" did to be overtly cheesy and campy.  I’m paraphrasing from Starkwell. 

[...]

[Naked Alice clone sits in a tub of water, actual Alice has nightmares.]

Lovelock: Did you see the way the director SEAMLESSLY showed us that she has telekinetic powers AND showed us a naked, confused and soaking wet Alice?

Starkwell: They’re getting better and better at working Naked Milla into different parts of the movie.

[...]

Then there was a zombie bird scene, and due to his irrational fear of birds, for the first time in my life, I saw Lovelock closing his eyes during a movie.  Starkwell missed a lot of what was going on, since he was busy ridiculing Lovelock.  A few people got pecked to death, but eventually Alice saved the day with her powers of explosion.

[...]

Starkwell: Nice of her to show up and re-join the convoy AFTER that random girl got pecked to death.

Lovelock: Wait... That blonde girl’s name is K-Mart?  Worst post-apocalyptic name ever.   She may as well be named TARGET or GONER… You know who lasts long?  People named SOLITAIRE or DESTRO or TRIXIE or DYNAMITE or NITRO.

Starkwell: I name you VILLAGE IDIOT.

[...]

[Claire and her convoy of survivors are HEADING TO VEGAS.  To find gas.]

Lovelock: Vegas will be crawling with zombies.  Shit, even before the apocalypse, half of the performers there were essentially the living dead.

Starkwell: I'm just glad no one said the over-used and totally played-out "Vegas, baby, Vegas."

[...]

So basically, while in Vegas, the convoy comes across a crate full of fast moving mutant zombies that the Umbrella Scientists left for them.  They bear some resemblance to the crazy zombies in Lenzi’s “Nightmare City”.  Could it be Anderson is paying HOMAGE?  I'm starting to think that maybe Anderson watches the same movies that we do.  

[...]

Lovelock: I kind of wish that the fats mutant zombies all had machetes.

[...]

Most of the convoy dies, including COWBOY, PIMP.  K-Mart lives… proving Lovelock wrong.  At least for now.  Anyways, Alice goes all NINJA and takes out the Umbrella scientists, and there were fistpumps performed all over the Zombie Hall TV room.  Anyways, they need to GET TO THE CHOPPER again, so, in order to infiltrate the secret Umbrella lab and get the chopper, Carlos goes KAMIKAZE and explodes himself in a big truck.  Lovelock cried while humming a George Harrison tune.  Starkwell smacked him in the back of the head.

[...]

[The convoy gang gets on the chopper, heads to Alaska.  Alice stays behind to head into the secret lab and finish up with Scientist dude.  Who is now a mutant super being thing.]

Lovelock:  Oh man, Milla Jovovich holding a DYING NAKED CONFUSED AND SOAKING WET Milla Jovovich!!!!!!!

Starkwell: Every movie they find a way to up the Naked Milla ante.

Lovelock: I can’t wait to see what they do next time around.

[...]

So, Alice takes care of Mutant Dude, and now, she wants to go after Captain Sunglasses in Tokyo.  She is of course going to bring with her, an army of one million Alice clones.  ROLL CREDITS.

[...]

Lovelock: Hopefully the first hour of the next movie is just a bunch of Naked Confused Milla Clones waking up a bunch of equally Naked Confused Milla Clones.

Starkwell: I’d watch that.

Lovelock: Dare to dream.

Resident Evil: Apocalypse.

Well, if history has taught us anything, this movie should start with a naked and confused Milla Jovovich.  I guess Paul Anderson likes showing his future wife off.  I should mention though, that while Anderson did write this one, a new director was brought on.  Maybe this will help... I guess we won't know until we get our 'Apocalypse' on.

[...]

[Intro is a recap of the entire first movie.]

Lovelock: Dude, we SOoooo could have skipped the first movie.

Starkwell: Maybe I should just skip this one.  Also... sorry dude, but it looks like we won’t get Naked Confused Milla to start this sucker off… Well, that is, unless you count the small shot of her in the recap.

Lovelock: No.  Failure.

[...]

[Jill Valentine is a SEXY COP, who’s OUT TO KICK some ASS.]

Lovelock: Seriously, Jill Valentine is a SEXY COP, who’s OUT TO KICK some ASS.

Starkwell: Looks like we done gots a SEXY COP, and she’s OUT TO KICK some ASS.

[...]

[Alice wakes up in some lab… naked.]

Lovelock: Success!

[...]

There was some pretty solid zombie mayhem.  Racoon City was over run, Starkwell and Lovelock were PUMPED.  Then a dude who looks kind of like George Harrison (according to Lovelock)  jumps out of a chopper shooting zombies in the air, and they laughed HARD.  Lovelock played a kick ass air guitar solo.

[...]

Lovelock: Here comes the sun.  Bitch.

Starkwell: Dude you’re nuts, he doesn’t look like George Harrison.

Lovelock: Not Beatles era, more like Traveling Wiburys timeframe.

[...]

They mostly just watched quietly as the story unfolded.  We have one group of survivors including JILL SEXYCOP, her cop friend, a reporter and some dude ('some dude' dies almost immediately).  They’re hauled up in a church, and we get our first view, in this movie, of the super mutant things.  This one is much faster than they were in the first film.  Anyways, I couldn’t always make out what they were saying because they spent a lot of time making fun of the actress playing Jill, and the way she held her gun.

[...]

Lovelock: “Bang bang.  I’m Jill and I’m here to party.”

Starkwell: “I’ve got you in my sites big boy.  You have the right to remain SEXY.”

[And so on and so forth.]

[...] 

[Alice flies through the window on a motorcycle.]

Starkwell: Good thing we knew she had a motorcycle.

Lovelock: Good thing she knew exactly where they were.

Starkwell: Good thing she wore her helmet.

Lovelock: Safety first!  As you crash through a window!

Starkwell: Good thing she picked an ALMOST skimpier and non-functional outfit than Jill is wearing.

Lovelock: Must be a competition.

[...]

[Topless zombies.]

Lovelock: Do you think this movie is to blame for all of those zombie stripper movies?

Starkwell: Even if it isn’t, that shit don’t belong.  Useless boobies.  Uwe Boll style.

[...]

Anyways, the heroes venture forward and have managed to keep the interest of Starkwell and Lovelock.  There are quite a few characters in this one, and, unlike the first in the series, they’ve actually kept most of them around past the first half hour of the film.  We assume that the different groups of survivors will all meet up at one point.  Then there was a graveyard scene, where bodies started exploding out of their graves and both Alice and Jill got their SEXYKILL LEGKICK powers on.  I mean, don’t get me wrong, Starkwell and Lovelock were still making fun of it, HARDCORE, but were having an absolute blast and eating mountains of popcorn.

[...]

[Evil Suits from Unbrella activate NEMESIS.]

Starkwell: Of course there’s a group of weekend warrior rednecks.

Lovelock: Of course the black guy is a pimp.  And has custom made guns.  And holds them sideways when aiming.

[NEMESIS kills all the rednecks, leaves Pimp alone.]

Starkwell: Is it just me or is the NEMESIS view kind of exactly like "Robocop" view?

Lovelock: Dead or alive, you’re coming with me.

[...]

Alice splits up from the group to have a one on one battle with NEMESIS.  “A boss battle, if you will”, says Lovelock.  Then Starkwell kicked him in his nuts.  The rest of the group, on a quest to find some British guy’s daughter, meets up with Pimp, obviously, and then with the other group, the chopper-jumping SWAT team, led by the guy that Lovelock says looks like George Harrison. 

[...]

[Reporter is eaten by a classroom full of zombie children.]

Lovelock: I give them all an ‘A+’.

Starkwell: Breaking news!  You’re dead!  And the crowd goes wild.

[...]

[On Jill's gun play.]

Lovelock: Seriously, she holds her fucking gun like a five year old child holds a water pistol.

Starkwell: That’s insulting, dude.  To five year olds.

[...]

Anderson seems to have no issue with introducing characters and then immediately offing them.  Starkwell and Lovelock both feel that this is an asset.  What isn’t an asset, according to Starkwell is that “Jill’s acting is atrocious” and “most of the animated characters in the video game series are less robotic than her.”  Then they made fun of how a kitchen scene with zombie dogs was a bit of a rip-off of the "Jurassic Park" kitchen scene.

[...]

[They have just under an hour to get to a chopper that is leaving Racoon City.]

Starkwell: So… basically… get to the chopper?

Lovelock: You’re doing it wrong… GET TO THA’ CHOPPAH!

[...]

Lovelock: Is it just me, or is Alice giving George Harrison Guy her Bedroom Eyes?  I mean “don’t worry… I’m not contagious…” What is that all about?

Starkwell: Seriously, dude.  Stop calling him George Harrison Guy.  It makes NO SENSE.

[...]

Then Alice has to fight NEMESIS again.  In front of a crowd.

[...]

[NEMESIS is actually BORING DUDE from the first movie.]

Starkwell: Might be the most obvious twist of all time.

[NEMESIS turns into a good guy!]

Starkwell: Might be the second most obvious twist of all time.

[...]

[Racoon City gets all ‘sploded.  Chopper crashes.]

Lovelock: Alice is dead?

Starkwell: Well, she’s on the cover of the next film, so I assume not.

[The Media disguises the incident as a reactor meltdown in the city.  That Unbrella tried to save Racoon City.]

Lovelock: It’s a bit far fetched that people would believe that.

Starkwell: Have you watched "FOX News" lately?

Lovelock: Good point.

[...]

[Alice is alive.  In a lab, in a tank of water (like Luke Skywalker), CONFUSED AND NAKED.]

Starkwell: And everything is right in the world.

Lovelock: How many times can one person wake up confused and naked?

Starkwell: Jovovich is DEFINITELY going for the record.

[During this naked confused part, she flashes back to OTHER naked confused parts of previous films.]

Lovelock: Exponential nakey-confused?  My brain just exploded.

[...]

Anyways, they set up the next film, and I guess Alice will have super powers, also, be a robot, also be a bad guy?  Maybe?  All in all, Starkwell and Lovelock had a lot of fun with this one, and are actually excited for the next one.  Anderson embraced the cheese here, and it certainly worked in his favor.

Resident Evil.

Love it or hate it, Paul Anderson’s “Resident Evil” series likely had a fair amount to do with the resurgence of zombie movies in blockbuster format at the beginning of the 21st century, and its subsequent boom of shitty b-grade trashy zombie camp.  Although none of the "Resident Evil" have really been critical successes, none have truly been flops at the box office, and the series has managed to stay afloat for not one, but five films over ten years.  Starkwell, Lovelock, meet Alice.

[...]

[One giant Pharmaceutical Company rules the world, pretty much.]

Starkwell: I thought this was a fictional movie.

Lovelock: Heyo!

[...]

[Scientists and employees of the Umbrella Corporation are trapped in research lab, someone released the ZOMBIE gas, or the T-Virus.]

Starkwell: Am I crazy or does the Umbrella corporation only seem to hire really good looking men and women between the ages of twenty-five and thirty?

[Milla Jovovich, wakes up naked, obviously.]

Lovelock: Would you rather this all look like a real corporation?  Have you seen what people in cubicles look like? They don't look like Milla Jovovich naked, I can tell you that much.

Starkwell: Yeah... well-

Lovelock: Shut up.  You’re ruining the side boob action.

[...]

Then the action packed music kicked in, as well as the pack of action.  Alice and some dude are taken by the Umbrella squad, and they all venture down a tunnel on a train, I assume to get to the super secret lab.  Alice doesn’t remember anything, but has flashes of a wedding to some dude who was hiding in the train’s closet.  It all seems fairly straight forward, and, thankfully according to Lovelock “not a whole hell of a lot like the original video game.”  To be fair, he doesn’t remember much, except that someone therein was a ‘Master of Unlocking’.  Anyways, they were quiet for a while.  It was all fairly by-the-numbers sci-fi horror, but as Starkwell points out “maybe it only seems 'by-the-numbers' because a lot of other movies borrowed from the same gene pool.”

[...]

[We see first zombie.]

Lovelock: I like where this is going.

[We see first glimpse of mutant zombie hybrid thingy things.]

Lovelock: Go onnnnn….

[...]

[Lasers head towards some of the hero squad in a hallway, they have to try and manoeuvre around them.  Each wave of lasers is harder than the preceding wave of lasers.]

Lovelock: That’s a little TOO video game-ish… Why would anyone design something like that?  Why wouldn’t they just send the “IMPOSSIBLE TO DODGE” laser combination right off the bat?

Starkwell: Seriously.  And from a FILM MAKING point of view, since they all died anyways, why not just have the first wave kill them all?

Lovelock: Well clearly Paul Anderson wanted to show people doing flips and shit.

[...]

What Starkwell and Lovelock DO enjoy is the fast pace, and the fact that the movie doesn’t take long to get going.  They, on the other hand, hate every single thing that Michelle Rodriguez says.  For example, lame things such as something “BITCH AIN’T STANDING NOW.”  Groan times a million.

[...]

[Crazy zombie madness.]

Lovelock: The zombies don’t look half bad, also, yay for people getting eaten.

[Alice apparently knows how to fight.]

Lovelock: Definitely where “The Bourne Identity” got all of its ideas.

Starkwell: Riiiiight… especially jump kicking the zombie dog?  Right?

Lovelock: Matt Damon couldn’t pull off that red dress thing that she's wearing, though.

Starkwell: Well, ANYWAYS, it’s nice to see a movie get zombie dogs right.

[...]

[The team try and fight and shut down the computer, the 'Red Queen', voiced by a young British girl.]

Lovelock:  Were they trying to make the Red Queen this annoying?

[...]

Non-stop zombie mayhem.

[...]

[Alice breaks a zombie’s neck.]

Starkwell: I don’t know that I would use my thighs to break the neck of a rabidly contagious zombie…

Lovelock: SHHhhh… she’s doing sexy kills.

[...]

More zombie mayhem, complete with GUY SACRIFICE staying back to hold the fort after being bitten and stranded, TOUGH CHICK LATINAPANTS who’s been half eaten but still not turning and fighting off the infection, ALICE VON SEXYKILL getting enough memory back to remember that there is a cure, and of course, finally EVIL McPLOT-TWIST shows his true colors.   Starkwell and Lovelock came up with the names.  There’s another character that they just call DUDE BORING.  He’s a scientist I think.

[...]

[Mutant thing kills McPLOT-TWIST, starts hunting the group but then…]

Lovelock: GUY SACRIFICE!  He’s ALIVE!!!!!

[For about another two minutes.]

[...]

Well, at least DUDE BORING survives.

[...]

[Alice wakes up in a facility.  Whole city is fucked.  They set it up for the sequel.]

Starkwell: Of course she’s naked.

Lovelock: Every movie should end with Naked and Confused Milla Jovovich.

Starkwell: Even kids’ movies?

Lovelock: ESPECIALLY kids’ movies.

[...]

A fair start to a series of films that would/could go on seemingly forever.