Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City
Once the booming home of pharmaceutical giant Umbrella Corporation, Raccoon City is now a dying Midwestern town. The company’s exodus left the city a wasteland…with great evil brewing below the surface. When that evil is unleashed, the townspeople are forever…changed…and a small group of survivors must work together to uncover the truth behind Umbrella and make it through the night.
- Released: 2021-11-24
- Runtime: 107 minutes
- Genre: Action, Horror, Mystery
- Stars: Robbie Amell, Hannah John-Kamen, Avan Jogia, Kaya Scodelario, Tom Hopper, Lily Gao, Holly de Barros, Chad Rook, Neal McDonough, Donal Logue, Janet Porter, Josh Cruddas, Sammy Azero, Marina Mazepa, Nathan Dales, Dylan Taylor, Carson Manning, Darren W. Marynuk, Stephannie Hawkins, Lauren Bill, Jenny Young, Matthew MacCallum, Pat Thornton, Pamela MacDonald, Nathaniel McParland, Aleks Alifirenko Jr., Kelly Reich, Jason Lee Bell, Amy Szoke, Kalie Hunter, Avaah Blackwell, Heloise Catherine Pead Galvin, Sophia Ann Pead Galvin, Andrea Ciacci, Lily Gail Reid, Daxton Gujral, Robert Chaumont, Jason Lee Bell
- Director: Johannes Roberts
Comments
- alim-18 - 15 June 2024
Almost enjoyable
First of all, me personally enjoyed it overall, but the Leon Kennedy as the main character of the game was not the same character we all know. He is represented far far away from what we all know and he is very weak, confused, indecisive and not effective at all. By the way, apart from that, the movie have a good storyline. They put things together very well; Almost a good adaptation from the game series, specially the locations and places was very close and familiar. Probably because of the given data and the blueprints. Anyway if you enjoyed the games (specially re2 and re3) you will enjoy this movie too, but Don't expect the same experience of course. - nrgko - 5 April 2024
At least they played some of the games first
The makers of this film do seem to have a surface level knowledge of the characters and events in the Resident Evil canon, but not a lot of interest or ability in making that canon work on film.
The completely frustrating thing about Resident Evil games, particularly the early Resident Evil games, is that they're actually very good. Not just on a gameplay level (tank controls are not for everyone, of course), but the stories are good. Seriously. And if you play them, it's not a thing you miss. They are straight-forward and unsubtle, but good - even in their old age. You would not know it looking at Paul W. S. Anderson's movies or the Netflix series, or this movie, but they really honestly are. There is so much intrigue and conspiracy, the characters are colourful and well formed, and the levels of unfolding mystery expand elegantly before you in the beautiful and striking environments in which and through which the story builds.
I'm joining the choir here but the question is why is nobody making these games into movies? There have been three separate adaptions of this franchise but I can say with absolute conviction, and correctness, that this franchise has never been adapted for the screen. A movie based on the Resident Evil games has never been attempted and Resident Evil: Welcome To Raccoon City is the latest movie in line to not attempt this. Why do they keep doing it? I just don't know. Even more flummoxing here is the amount of nods to Resident Evil in this film is indicative of somebody who has played and enjoyed the games. Why didn't you make a movie of them then? Here's an analogy (pun intended, more on that later): these RE movies are like candy. Resident Evil games are like a big fat fresh raspberry, okay? Stay with me on this. Juicy, off the vine, full of sugar yes, but natural sugars and generally quite good for you. You love them, you love raspberries. Some big company sees you love raspberries and they say "hey! I see you love raspberries, well I've made this". They hand you bag of candy. The name on the bag is "Raspberries", you eat one, it's okay, it tastes a bit like raspberries. "That's alright" you tell them, and you ask "how did you get it to taste like raspberries?" and they tell you "we used castoreum to give it that sweet flavour, which we extract from the anal glands of beavers." At which point, you really have to ask "why didn't you just use raspberries?"
I feel like this every time I watch this stuff. I put on my clown wig and my clown paint and I hope for something real and I get beaver anal glands all up in my mouth, as per my analogy above.
I will say this in RE:WTRC's defense, it does at least approach everything with a sense of fun. Paul Anderson's films did not do this. He made an action franchise about how his mid-talent actor wife is a superhero and demanded we take it seriously as if it was an Andrei Tarkovsky movie. That franchise didn't crack a smile once. This movie is a little more wacky and self-aware and that's good. It might tell you a story about a person's superpowered wife but it doesn't believe in it. It doesn't stare you in the eye and demand you believe this story about its superpowered wife. Thank God for that.
It's worth a watch I guess. It's fun enough but it is a B-Movie despite the big name distributors like Sony. In all cases it feels like a fan made YouTube movie made by talented rank amateurs with not enough ability or experience to create something truly impactful. I'm okay with that, I like that kind of thing but don't go in expecting anything more.
I liked this film well enough but it's just a zombie movie. Great soundtrack and some of the zombie effects are very good, CGI is alright. They do a good job of rebuilding some of the environments from the Resident Evil 2 remake. Lisa Trevor fights a bunch of lickers as well, which is something I never thought I'd see. It's surprisingly well paced for a movie that tries to cover the first four games (1, 2, 3, and Code:Veronica) in just under two hours. That's all I can give it.
