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.

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.