Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City – A Dull and Dated Affair

The original Resident Evil video game was released in 1996 and from there, the rest was history as the popular survival horror game since spawned 9 other games over the following 15 years and a 6 film franchise from 2002-2016 starring Milla Jovovich. Despite the latter film franchise seemingly wrapped up, the property seemingly still has some legs as Sony has decided to go back to the beginning in the hopes of creating a new franchise set in the Resident Evil universe. When it comes to Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, the film definitely goes back to the beginning both narratively and literally for better or worse. The film feels straight out of 1996 in many ways which could be jarring for some considering that it is currently 2021. Boasting the kind of quality and presentation akin to a straight-to-video offering from that year, the film can still somewhat entertain in spite of this for reasons that may or may not be intentional. Though when viewed through the right lens, it could succeed as a cult favorite but for now, the film is a thin and rushed mess.

Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City is set in 1998 during the final years of a Raccoon City that had been left ravaged at the hands of the shady Umbrella Corporation who were getting ready to leave town and ravage somewhere else. Those with the means to leave had since left while those to poor to leave remained. Now a shell of what it once was, the city was merely a ticking time bomb. As that bomb finally went off, it was up to the few survivors of the Raccoon City Police Department to survive the night and uncover the truth behind Umbrella’s involvement in their city along the way. Perhaps this was intentional due to budgetary limitations but things were on the sparse side overall which does get repetitive visually and thus dull rather quickly as audiences are left waiting for something to happen which never does. However, more or less already knowing what happens here after all the video games and films that came previously likely played a role in this.

Any attempt at character development is essentially irrelevant thus relegating the film’s characters to mere fodder. Lazily depending on previous connections to these characters, the film offers very little reason to care about them in any way whatsoever. At the end of the day, most audiences probably won’t care about these kinds of things anyway. They just want some zombie action. In that regard, the film disappoints, not just because there wasn’t much of it to begin with but mostly because what the film did have was just dull though gruesome at times. The dull and lifeless writing and direction also didn’t do the film any favors. Characters simply went through the motions which certainly did not inspire any excitement. That being said, the film’s dated nature and bad dialog can still be somewhat entertaining. To top it all off, to the surprise of no one, Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City is only the beginning for which the filmmakers and studio hope to be another Resident Evil franchise. Stay tuned for a mid-credits scene.

Going along with the whole B-movie feel, the acting followed suit. As mentioned, the writing didn’t do them any favors but they did the best with what they had. Meanwhile, there was also very little chemistry to be had here. Amell, Tom Hopper, Hannah John-Kamen, Donal Logue, and Neal McDonough were fine as Chris Redfield, Albert Wesker, Jill Valentine, Chief Brian Irons, and William Birkin respectively with the latter camping it up but Scodelario and Jogia and Claire Redfield and Leon S. Kennedy and their chemistry were the clear standouts and were sort of fun to watch in the midst of the chaos.

At the end of the day, Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City is a film that will surely divide audiences. Fans of the Resident Evil series will probably find enough to enjoy here but do we really need another film let alone another reboot? However, those looking to turn their minds off for 100 or so minutes watching a B-movie may also have some fun here.

still courtesy of Sony Pictures

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Keith Noakes

The EIC of the coincidentally-named keithlovesmovies.com. A Canadian who prefers to get out of the cold and into the warmth of a movie theatre.