Stuart:

To say that this is the best of the Resident Evil franchise probably isn’t that high a complement, but Milla Jovovich’s latest waste of her acting talents is the first to be truly entertaining. Resident Evil: Extinction borrows from a multiplicity of sources. The most obvious is Mad Max 2, with oil scarce in a post-apocalyptic desert, and a ragtag bunch of survivors travelling along in a convoy. It even nicks an idea from the closing moments of the Spierig Brothers’ Undead.

Milla Jovovich looks as cool as ever in (literally) her own snazzy threads as she kicks, shoots and machetes her way through countless undead. Ali Larter joins the cast along with returning actors like Oded Fehr, Iain Glen and Mike Epps, and is in charge of the group of survivors whose number swells and shrinks in a seemingly random manner.

Australia’s Russell Mulcahy is at the helm this time, and although he’s never really matched his first Hollywood feature, Highlander, he does bring an edgy visual style to the film. The action is good, though there’s nothing particularly memorable. Whilst there are way too many money shots of zombies’ brains splattering, it at least provides the action that Rogue Assassin (War) failed to deliver. Writer Paul W.S. Anderson doesn’t really go anywhere new, and it’s astounding to believe that after hundreds of zombie/werewolf/vampire flicks, a character would still try to keep the fact that they’d been bitten a secret from everyone else.

Like many third films, this one goes out of its way to tie back into the first one, and it does so without ruining the original (as if that were possible…). Presumably the Resident Evil movies have a die-hard fan base, otherwise this wouldn’t keep happening. It must be said that it (hopefully) concludes the series on a (relatively) high note.