Resident Evil: Apocalypse

Resident Evil: Apocalypse is currently streaming in Australia on Disney Plus, and in the US on YouTube TV, and it earns its premise rather than just borrowing genre trappings. The length is exactly right for the story it is telling — nothing rushed, nothing dragged out. 4,800 viewers have already rated it on TMDB — the kind of consensus that does not happen by accident. Watch it for Milla Jovovich — the performance elevates material that could easily tip into self-seriousness. There is no real reason to keep putting it off — it is right there on Disney Plus.

Resident Evil: Apocalypse arrived without much fanfare and built its audience the hard way — through word of mouth. Resident Evil: Apocalypse treats its concept seriously enough to follow it all the way through. As the city is locked down under quarantine, Alice finds out that the people that died from the previous incident at the Umbrella Corporation have turned into zombies. She then joins a small band of elite soldiers, who are enlisted to rescue the missing daughter of the creator of the mutating T-virus. Once lack of luck and resources happen, they begin to wage an exhilarating battle to survive and escape before the Umbrella Corporation erases its experiment from the face of the earth. Milla Jovovich and Sienna Guillory lead a cast that brings real weight to the material. It was released in 2004. The rules of Resident Evil: Apocalypse's world are consistent enough that the big swings never feel like cheating. It knows exactly what it is, and does not try to be anything else.

Viewers burned by ambitious sci-fi that could not sustain its premise should give Resident Evil: Apocalypse a chance. It does not lean on comparisons to make its case. The complete film is available and best experienced without too much prior knowledge of where it goes. Milla Jovovich grounds the bigger ideas in something human. Once you are in, you will want to talk about it.