Resident Evil: Extinction

A contender for Oscar - Best Adaptation of a Video Game? Probably not. But Resident Evil: Extinction definitely leads the pack in this generally so-so zombie film trilogy. A bloody thumbs up!

Written by BHM Contributor Horror Queen
September 21, 2007

Release: September 21, 2007
Directed by: Russell Mulcahy
Written by: Paul W.S. Anderson

Starring:
Milla Jovovich as Alice
Oded Fehr as Carlos Olivera
Ali Larter as Claire
Iain Glen as Dr. Isaacs
Ashanti as Betty

In Resident Evil Extinction, the third episode of the Resident Evil films, our heroin Alice finds herself a bit of a loner on a planet of flesh-eating zombies. In her own words “good thing we like a challenge,” she is determined to save what’s left of the human race. To do this, Alice must not only avoid the millions of undead headed her way, she must also avert the Umbrella Corporation’s sophisticated efforts to find her for their own evil gain. As luck would have it, in the last episode Alice was captured by Umbrella and genetically altered to have super-human strength. Not a bad thing really. Cancel that gym membership.

Why the loner thing? Alice has separated herself from her friends and one-time love Carlos so as not to endanger them with her super-enemy status – enemy to Umbrella, enemy to zombies, enemy to all girls not having hot bodies, etc. So while she travels the desert in Road Warrior style, Alice’s friends are in a nearby caravan doing the same. Eventually they meet up for what reminds us of a scene in Hitchcock’s The Birds. Picture similar images but with huge ugly zombie birds, able to break into a bus and kill passengers. Where do you go after a horrific thing like that happens? Vegas baby!

The fun Vegas is of course gone and what remains is hotel and casino fuselage and a lot of dust…oh and more zombies. How can our friends escape the zombies? Eventually with a suicide mission. Huh? Yes that’s right, a suicide mission. In a heroic effort to save the world, Carlos decides to blow up some zombies on the road to make way for his friends driving behind. For the short distance he drove into the mass of zombies before lighting the match, he could probably have stood back and thrown the dynamite, not having to commit suicide at all. Oh well. Hindsight.

Meanwhile, back at Umbrella, Dr. Isaacs who is supposedly working on an antidote to domesticate the zombies into submission actually becomes obsessed with using his medicinal powers to create super zombies that he will lead in ruling the world. Sort of a God complex gone awry when he starts getting high on his own supply. “I am the future,” rages the zombie-Doctor. “No,” replies a cool Alice, “you’re just another asshole.”

The good news is global warming, extreme poverty, AIDS and other global human crises being addressed by the United Nations Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) are now moot. The bad news is…well let’s just say we’re equally screwed.

All in all Resident Evil Extinction takes us on a hell of a ride and leaves us wondering - will there be a fourth episode or…is there life after extinction?

Horror Queen Says: Bloody Thumbs Up!

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