Zach Cregger’s Barbarian and Weapons were easily two of my favorite horror movies of the past few years. I’ll go out on the limb saying he’s good at horror. But even so, the idea that anyone could properly tackle a Resident Evil movie seemed a daunting one. Cregger has assured fans of the games that he is a massive fan himself. Specifically he calls out Resident Evil 2, 4, VII, Village, and Requiem as his standouts. Very good company to keep. Would it translate, though? Well, Nerdist was among a group of media types who got to check out the first 18 minutes of the movie and it definitely feels like a Cregger movie, and it has the potential to be a very faithful RE movie.
The Opening 18 Minutes of Resident Evil
Unlike Cregger’s earlier films, Resident Evil will doggedly follow one main character the whole time. In this case, it’s Bryan, played by Austin Abrams. The movie opens with Bryan, a medical delivery driver, arriving at St. George’s Hospital to drop off a transplant organ. It’s a supremely blizzardy night and Bryan really wants to get home to talk to his girlfriend about her surprise pregnancy. A lot of the footage we saw has Bryan on the phone with her saying the wrong things when she asks his take on it all.
A doctor finally takes the organ from him, but fails to sign for it. Bryan goes to talk to the nurse at the front desk and Doctor Who fans will be delighted to see Jo Martin, the Fugitive Doctor, as the stone-faced, unhelpful nurse. As he’s about to bounce, another nurse pops her head out and asks if he can make another delivery. It’s out of the usual area so it plays double. It’s a very important something and it’s going to Raccoon City General. Dun dun dun.
Bryan doesn’t have chains on his car, so the twisty mountain roads to Raccoon City have him swerving all over. Visibility is nil and he’s clearly distracted talking on the phone to his girlfriend. Out of nowhere, a woman walks out into the road and he plows right into her.
This is when Cregger’s take on the material really comes to the forefront. For the next several minutes, we see as Bryan checks on the woman he hit. We clearly know she’s a zombie, but he doesn’t. So when he drives with her in his car, puts on her seatbelt, and talks to a police officer, all we can do is wait for the inevitable. Bryan is able to convince the cop of the severity of the situation and that he needs to go to Raccoon City to deliver the whatever it is. The cop agrees and the pair put the wounded woman (aka zombie) in the police car.
As they drive, the police car swerves and flips over. Bryan goes to see what happened and finds the officer dead and the woman nowhere to be found. While trying to radio for help, the zombie woman attacks and Bryan begins running around the flipped car with the cop’s gun as the woman chases. Bryan is definitely not a cool and capable guy. He eventually manages to fire several shots, at least one of which goes into the woman and it seems like he’s killed her.
He goes back to his car to find it won’t start. Bryan then realizes one of his errant shots went through his car’s engine. It’s cooked. So he has little other option but to walk to the light of a nearby farmhouse… As he trudges along, the title Resident Evil appears.
Our Thoughts
The 18 minutes positively flew by and were exciting and scary with the requisite bits of dread. It was a lot funnier than maybe I expected, but it felt right in line with Cregger’s other work. Abrams is very funny and super relatable, a far less druggy version of the slacker he played in Weapons. In the post-screening Q&A, Cregger said he wants this movie to feel like a roller coaster ride, which definitely comes through in the opening. We only get one zombie here but already we see how upsetting they are, and how dangerous.
The one thing that wasn’t immediately apparent in the footage is that anything was all that Resident Evil-ish. It’s a zombie movie, the kind we’ve seen a ton before. However, we also got to see the new trailer, which will drop soon, and that highlights the very next sequence at the farmhouse. This is instantly more like the game. Scarce resources, limited ammo, and even a room with a typewriter in it for safety. If you’re worried Cregger, despite his claims, doesn’t have the RE chops, rest assured.
The completed movie will only be 95 minutes and I can already tell I’ll want a whole lot more.
Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil hits theaters September 18.
Kyle Anderson is the Senior Editor for Nerdist. He hosts the weekly pop culture deep-dive podcast Laser Focus. You can find his film and TV reviews here. Follow him on Letterboxd.