Writer-director Zach Cregger’s upcoming Resident Evil franchise may not be one of the biggest films of the year when comparing its $80 million budget to behemoths such as The Odyssey or any superhero fare (even The Devil Wears Prada 2 had a larger budget). Despite this, it has been one of the more discussed films of the season, with Cregger’s smash hit Weapons still fresh in the minds of audiences, the film being an adaptation of the incredibly popular Resident Evil videogame franchise (it is the most successful horror game franchise of all-time), and a previous line of Resident Evil films (that have as much to do with the games as a cannibal does with veganism) all contributing to the discourse. However, the discourse around the film has had a consistently vocal negative stream of commentary from people who are already dismissing the film as a soulless cash-grab, to the point that Cregger himself has said that he feels like he’s ‘running for office’ in trying to promote the film and prove that he is not a LARPer (a derogatory term for someone who pretends to be a fan of something or has only a surface-level understanding of it).
This commentary from some fans is honestly quite disappointing to see, because it has led to numerous hostile statements about Cregger’s work before the film has even been released for public consumption. Cregger’s Resident Evil will not follow any of the fan-favourite characters of the game, and instead will function as an original story set in the same world, specifically during the Raccoon City outbreak, which is explored in the Resident Evil 2 and 3 videogames. While this take may be seen as unexpected, it has earned more vitriol than could be considered necessary, especially considering the precedents there are for original takes on IP, and Cregger has been vocal about his love for the franchise, which is more than can be said for the creators behind some iconic IP adaptations.
Horror is a genre which has a particularly strong track-record of adaptations changing their material and creating something memorable. Diving straight into the classics, Stanley Kubrick’s The Shining changed so much of Stephen King’s novel that the author himself disowned the adaptation. King’s tale of an alcoholic’s fight to protect his family while battling his demons (and the spirits of a hotel) was changed into a story of a child and his mother being terrorised by his abusive father (and the spirits of a hotel). Even with these huge changes and a lack of empathy for the Jack Torrance character, Kubrick’s film has risen above King’s book in cultural circles, and it can almost be guaranteed that when you think of The Shining, you picture Jack Nicholson dragging an axe with his malicious grin, not Jack Torrance wielding a croquet mallet as in the novel.
More recent examples can be found in Mike Flanagan’s series The Haunting of Hill House, The Haunting of Bly Manor, and The Fall of the House of Usher, all of which include heavy reworkings of their source material. Hill House is transported from a psychological experiment with strangers to a generational story about love and loss; Bly Manor turns Henry James’s stiff novella into an 80s-set story also involving love and loss; and House of Usher adapts multiple Edgar Allan Poe stories for a Succession-style story about a cursed family and the deaths of all its members (there’s less love and loss in this one). Regardless of all these changes, these series have released to critical acclaim, with Hill House in particular being viewed as a modern classic.
With such precedents (and a backlog of two popular films with Barbarian and Weapons) it’s mystifying that Cregger has been subject to such hostility, but for the people who love the franchise (such as myself), Cregger’s statements about his approach could hint towards a more interesting film than simply adapting one of the games. The director ahs gone on the record saying that instead of trying to put one of the games onto a screen for people to watch and effectively removing the interactive element of the franchise, he has tried to recreate the experience of playing the game for an audience. As opposed to telling a story with Leon Kennedy, Jill Valentine, or either of the Redfield siblings, Cregger’s film is going to follow Bryan, a medical courier trapped in the middle of the Raccoon City outbreak.
The survival horror franchise’s roots are in limiting player power and agency by restricting their ammunition and health, which Cregger has been seen doing in the trialers for the film, such as when Austin Abrams’s Bryan finds a shotgun in a house, but then runs around the space trying to find ammunition. This is something that every Resident Evil player has experienced. Compared to the previous Resident Evil films, I personally find this concept intriguing, as it feels much closer to the games than any of the other films did, and those even included the characters from the game (as well as a wholly original character who seemed to be good at everything and a storyline that became laughably estranged from the source material over time)
Regardless of whether Cregger’s film and his approach lands with audiences or not, Resident Evil should not be judged so harshly when the creative force behind it and the precedents of the horror genre show that great work can come from taking on a popular IP with a fresh lens. I for one will reserve judgement and welcome Cregger’s film with open arms when seeing Resident Evil on opening night.
Resident Evil releases September 18th.
