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Released by: Sony
Released on: May 16th, 2017.
Director: Paul W.S. Anderson
Cast: Milla Jovovich, Ruby Rose, Ali Larter
Year: 2017
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The Movie:
The 'final chapter' of the Resident Evil series begins with Alice (Milla Jovovich) explaining how and why the T-virus came to do what it has done to the world - see, Dr. James Marcus (Mark Simpson) wanted to cure his daughter Alicia (Ever Anderson) from progeria and in trying to do so worked with the Umbrella Corporation. Of course, it all went wrong when his associate Dr. Alexander Isaacs (Iain Glen) betrayed him. This led to Marcus's intent to close down the program when he saw what the virus he'd helped create would do. Isaacs went to Umbrella CEO Albert Wesker (Shawn Roberts) and, eventually, Marcus was killed leaving Isaacs Alicia's legal guardian. Why does this matter? Because it means he controls her shares in the company, the ones she inherited after her father was killed. Shortly after, Isaacs creates the Red Queen (who is intentionally made to look like Alicia), the T-Virus is unlashed and what first takes out Raccoon City eventually causes a worldwide outbreak.
With that out of the way, we find Alice wandering alone through what's left of a massive city. She finds a car and is then chased by a huge flying monster that she eventually defeats. From here, she heads indoors and meets with the Red Queen who tells her of an antidote to the virus that Umbrella has locked away inside The Hive. If she doesn't take care of this in forty-eight hours, they'll use the virus against the survivors. With no other choice, Alice makes her way through what's left of Raccoon City to the Hive, attacked by hordes of minions along the way. When she slips up and gets knocked out, she wakes up inside a caravan of sorts where Isaacs is there to talk to her - this confuses her, as she killed him some time ago. Turns out it was one of his clones. They fight and Alice eventually escapes, heading further into Raccoon City. When she's injured, kindly Doc (Eoin Macken) helps her out along with fellow survivors, Razor (Fraser James), Christian (William Levy) and Cobalt (Rola). Eventually Claire Redfield (Ali Larter) show up to talk to Alice about what's really going on here.
Alice insists on heading into the Hive to take care of things, meanwhile Isaacs is planning his revenge against her and assembling Umbrella's troops to help him stop her for good.
This final entry in the series is entertaining enough, but don't expect much in the way of new ground to be tread. The movie brings the storyline to a reasonably satisfying conclusion but in terms of the visuals, it's edited with so many fast cuts that it's almost dizzying at times. There are shots here that last less than a second and this, combined with some seriously dizzying camerawork, results in a movie that's more hyperactive than it is anything else.
Still, if you like the Resident Evil movies, you'll probably enjoy this one. It's got a lot of action in it and some of those action set pieces are impressive in their scope. We also get the series requisite zombie carnage delivered in pretty liberal doses. The performances aren't particularly deep and the characters not all that well fleshed out, but fans of Milla Jovavich will enjoy watching her run around this apocalyptic wasteland kicking ass and taking names. She does this well and she looks great doing it.
Again, not a perfect film by any stretch but as far as disposable entertainment goes, you could do worse. As far as this being the true final chapter? We'll see. We won't spoil the ending but let it suffice to say that once you see it for yourself it wouldn't be all that shocking to find out that Alice came back for another round.
Video/Audio/Extras:
Resident Evil: The Final Chapter arrives on Blu-ray in an AVC encoded 1080p high definition transfer framed at 2.4.1 widescreen on a 50GB disc. As you'd expect from a brand new transfer of a studio backed film shot on high end HD video, it looks immaculate. There is some very minor motion blur in some of the really fast moving action scenes but that's really the only thing worth complaining about here. Otherwise, this is a top notch effort that shows excellent detail and texture, fantastic color reproduction and really strong black levels.
The English language DTS-HD 7.1 Master Audio track on this disc is stellar. There's fantastic channel separation throughout the film, the levels are perfectly balanced and the track is crystal clear - just like you'd expect from a brand new major studio production. It's an aggressive and involving track that really brings the action scenes to life. When the movie goes off, it really goes off, this is impressive, aggressive and very immersive. Full marks for the audio here! Optional English SDH are offered as well.
The main extra on the disc is the inclusion of the Retaliation Mode viewing option. When enabled, director Paul W.S. Anderson and leading lady Milla Jovovich essentially pop up throughout the movie to explain how and why certain scenes were made the way that they were. There is a lot of talk here about the action set pieces but also some of the story elements. This mode also uses some interesting behind the scenes footage and clips throughout playback to kind of put you 'there' when they're talking about certain things. Lots of interesting stuff here for Resident Evil fans, including some information on how the effects and stunts were accomplished.
From there, we get a few moderately interesting featurettes, beginning with the nine minute long Stunts And Weaponry piece. As you'd expect from the title, this looks at the intricacies of some of the stunt sequences featured in the film and also shows what went into getting the actors familiar with the various weapons that are used throughout the movie. In the four minute Explore The Hive we get a quick tour of the main location used in the film while in the seven minute The Bad Ass Trinity And The Women of Resident Evil featurette we get an EPK style piece that talks up the series' penchant for casting strong female leads.
Outside of that the disc includes a four minute 'Sneak Peek At Resident Evil: Vendetta,' animated menus and chapter selection.
The disc comes housed in a slipcover. Also included inside the Blu-ray case is an insert card containing a digital HD download code.
The Final Word:
Resident Evil: The Final Chapter brings the series to a fairly decent close. This isn't a modern classic by any stretch but it features a nice mix of horror and action, a few fun performances and some decent effects work. Sony's Blu-ray release looks and sounds really good and features a decent selection of supplements as well. Hardly a good starting point for the series, but established fans of the franchise should enjoy this (supposedly) final entry in the run.
Click on the images below for full sized Blu-ray screen caps!
