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Parents' Guide to

Resident Evil: Apocalypse

By Nell Minow, Common Sense Media Reviewer

age 18+

By-the-numbers gory horror flick -- not for kids.

Movie R 2004 90 minutes
Resident Evil: Apocalypse Poster Image

A Lot or a Little?

What you will—and won't—find in this movie.

Community Reviews

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age 14+

Based on 9 parent reviews

NojEsco
NojEsco Adult
October 10, 2019
age 15+

Closest of all Live-Action to Quality

Resident Evil Apacalypse is not only the closest entry to an actual adaptation of the franchise into a movie (that isn't a sequel that is), and along with that is the one with what is easily the best cinematography, blocking, practical effects and zombie acting. It also manages to have fun with itself despite how grim everything around it is. And I must say, hats off to the Director for actually making a zombie movie give a true feeling of scale; even the best zombie movies, far better than this, are not able to achieve this as well. And the Nemesis vs STARS scene was legitimately gripping if too short. Now, having said that, the main protagonist is just about as unrelatable as with the rest of the series, the writing is still mediocre at best, its over-edited, and really just feels like some genuinely talented people made a movie that they were over-qualified for. In relation to vices, this movie has characters swear at random times - not in ways that work like horror or shock (like in the recent RE2 remake), but rather they swear to sound tough. The heroes also seem to smoke heavily for no real reason other than the fact that Writer/Producer Paul WS Anderson thinks that this makes them look cool, when really it just makes them look like a bunch of punks playing dress-up as police. I will not say that the violence is excessive, however, despite how much there is, as none of it is beyond what would be realistic if such a situation presented itself.

This title has:

Too much swearing
Too much drinking/drugs/smoking
Chloe Lynn Cui Treska
Chloe Lynn Cui Treska Adult
June 25, 2019
age 16+

Ages 16+

Second installment
See all 9 parent reviews

What's the Story?

In RESIDENT EVIL: APOCALYPSE, that nasty old Umbrella Corporation, "the largest and most powerful corporation in the world," is up to its bad old tricks again. This time, it unleashes a virus on the residents of Raccoon City. The virus kills them. But then "they don't stay dead," which means lots and lots of zombies of every age, shape, and size. After various experiments in the Hive, Alice (Milla Jovovich) now has enhanced powers and joins an intrepid group trying to escape from the quarantined city. But first they must rescue the young daughter of a scientist so that he will tell them how to get out. The group includes a reporter with a video camera, two military rescue operatives, and a smart aleck (Mike Epps).

Is It Any Good?

Our review:
Parents say (9 ):
Kids say (16 ):

Still more video game than story, this film mostly a series of confrontations -- in a church, in a school, on the street, with guns, with knives, with kick-boxing, with rocket launchers and grenades. And there's hand-to-hand combat with a beauty and a beast.

It's pretty much by the numbers, and this stuff works a lot better as an interactive game than a story. But Resident Evil: Apocalypse is a slight improvement over the original, thanks to a lively and likeable performance by Epps and a couple of funny moments to break the tension. Pay attention at the end of the scene with the zombie Dobermans for the best one.

Talk to Your Kids About ...

  • Families can talk about the enduring appeal of zombie movies like Resident Evil: Apocalypse. Why is it such a popular horror genre?

  • How does the movie demonstrate the way an organization could try to influence the news. What did it mean to say that the STARS had become "expendable assets?" What can keep a corporation from becoming as powerful as Umbrella Corp? Are there less extreme cases you can think of in real life?

  • What are some of the challenges of turning a video game into a movie? How do the Resident Evil movies compare to the video games?

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