Resident Evil: Extinction (2007)

It may be impossible to make a good movie out of a video game. I can't think of any example where it's gone right. But I don't see why -- it's not like the end of the world isn't interesting enough, or Milla Jovovich isn't talented enough to carry a movie by herself. Okay, just kidding about the second part.

The terrible premise: 5 years after a zombie virus made everyone into zombies or something, Alice (Jovovich) drives around the desert killing zombies and stuff. Meanwhile, other people get killed by zombies. And, corporations are baaaaad!

The first thing that scared me about this scary movie was the number of familiar faces, such as Ali Larter (Heroes) and Ashanti. Yes, ASHANTI. Like the end of the world isn't bad enough, I'm looking at Ashanti on the big screen. I guess she had to record an album or something because she gets eaten by zombie birds like as soon as the opening credits finish rolling.

Anyway, the whole world has been turned into desert wasteland, which is a convenient way to save money on sets. Alice rides around killing zombies and wearing sensible survival gear, such as a miniskirt with garter belt and stockings. She must have seen that on Survivorman or something. In the first action scene, Alice answers a distress call that turns out to be hillbillies trying to feed her to their zombie dogs. This is a situation I just don't understand so let's move on.

Basically, some guy in a research facility is trying to cure the zombie virus, and he needs Alice's blood to do that. For some reason, this movie makes the scientist the bad guy! I know he has a British accent and everything, but he's the only one I agree with in this movie. What's so evil about trying to cure the zombie virus? But he's part of a corporation, so he's evil. It's too bad that Alice is such a fucking hippie that she won't cooperate with him for the good of mankind.

Then there is the matter of the bird attack. All of a sudden, a swarm of zombie crows attacks this caravan of survivors and eats most them alive. My question is, if animals can become zombies too, WHERE ARE THE REST OF THEM?! Why isn't anyone worried about ZOMBIE RATTLESNAKES? ZOMBIE GRIZZLY BEARS? I can't believe how fast they killed Ashanti though. She must have been singing her greatest hits until the director was like, "Ash, there's been a script revision where you quit singing and get off my set. So uh, let's feed you to birds."

In fact, nothing scary actually happens in Extinction, but it tries to convince you that something is happening by having sudden loud noises for no reason. For example, Alice's foot bumps a jar on the floor somewhere, and the "clink" sound effect was like someone came into the theater and broke the jar over my head. Which I guess is pretty scary, but has nothing to do with zombies.

To its credit, this movie contains one of the most amazing death scenes in cinema history, where Carlos (Oded Fehr) is surrounded by zombies and finds a huge blunt nearby, so he lights up and gets soooooo high while zombies devour him. I mean, wow.

Recommendation: Why don't I just tell you that Paul W.S. Anderson (Alien Vs. Predator) wrote this movie, and you'll probably have a good idea of whether you should see it or not.

Pathfinder (2007)

A while ago I saw Pathfinder in the theater. Maybe you haven't heard of this movie, and I can't imagine why since the public demand for a shitty movie about Vikings terrorizing Native Americans was so high. Perhaps I can jog your memory by mentioning that it stars Karl Urban, who played John "Reaper" Grimm in the movie adaptation of Doom.

I saw Pathfinder with a friend who worked on the movie, and we were fortunate enough to be the entire audience at this showing, because Spider-Man 3 had just opened. Also, it was Pathfinder, so London 2: Londoner could have been the only other choice that week and we still would have been alone in that theater.

Since we had the theater all to ourselves, my friend was able to provide a running commentary on the movie and her experience working with this shitty director whose name I don't even feel like looking up. All you need to know is that he was German, and he thought he was making an amazing movie. He also thought he was making a gritty movie by draining most of the color from every shot so I thought the movie was supposed to be in black and white. "These shots were gorgeous the way they shot them," my friend said. "Now I have no idea what's going on."

My personal favorite element of the whole movie is how many different seasons each scene took place in. I mean, it takes some nerve to intercut snowy landscapes with sunny hillsides IN THE SAME SCENE as if they're taking place CONTINUOUSLY. This movie really had some balls.

Also, Pathfinder kept showing Native Americans being unable to handle their own environment, like they keep drowning or breaking through frozen ice or running into bears and almost biting the dust. Or falling onto wooden spikes that THEY THEMSELVES SET UP. Like, the Native Americans in this movie are clowns. They could not be more clueless about what is involved in being a Native American. They're always so cold and hungry and have no idea what to do about it.

Anyway, that's all. Wow, what a terrible movie. I was kind of jealous of my friend for working on it, though, because she got a rare glimpse directly into the mind of a director who thinks he's making GOLD before it ends up on this website.

She's the Man (2006)

I’m a little speechless after this one. Don’t you remember seeing this trailer and feeling so uncomfortable? That’s what the whole movie is like. She’s the Man is based on Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, but not really. I mean, I doubt Shakespeare thought his name would be on a movie where people in drag put tampons in their noses. But I’m not an English major.

The terrible premise: Viola (Amanda Bynes) goes undercover as her twin brother Sebastian to join the boy’s soccer team, and falls in love with Duke, her male roommate. So basically it’s a remake of Boys Don’t Cry.

Among other things, She’s the Man suffers from being fundamentally dishonest: Amanda Bynes is, in fact, not the man. She’s not any man that has ever existed, because her impersonation of a man is so weird and spastic, you would think she had never interacted with a man before. Viola breaks character at the drop of a fucking hat, and covers by lowering her voice and croaking, “Dude, man, bro, etc.” For god’s sake, she has a twin brother -- shouldn’t she have some idea what the male version of herself would act like?

Somehow, everyone on campus immediately buys that Viola is a man. If I saw this creature stumbling down the hall of my dormitory, I would call the police and tell them a butch lesbian on heroin was lurking in the boy’s locker room. None of these guys think she’s a butch lesbian -- they think “Sebastian” is a ladies man, even though she “accidentally” tells Duke that he’s hot, ogles him in the locker room, and caresses his ass while they’re hugging. And Duke is never as upset by these things as he should be. Like, after a while, Duke must be gay. Come on.

Also, the whole premise of the movie collapses when it becomes obvious that Viola fucking sucks at soccer. She cooked up this whole plan to prove that she’s good enough to play sports with the boys, but guess what? As I mentioned earlier, she fucking sucks at soccer, so the coach won’t even let her play in “the big game” unless she practices like 20 hours a day. Viola sucks at soccer almost as much as she sucks at being a man, so it’s hard to understand why she’s doing either except that she’s starring in a movie about playing soccer and being a man.

By the way, Amanda Bynes thinks she’s really, really funny. She thinks she is Lucille Ball in this movie. I wrote a note during this movie: “It’s the most acting ever done by a face.” Someone must have told her that more facial expressions equals more comedy, and also that no one can hear you when you make witty asides in response to whatever just happened.” So many “witty” asides, like everyone around her is deaf. This is in addition to her tendency to explicitly state what’s going on in a scene in the middle of the scene.

Recommendation: Okay but secretly though I loved this movie. Just kidding. Or am I?