RESIDENT EVIL: DAMNATION

It is the year 2011 when Leon Scott Kennedy is called back, while he was on vacation, by the American army to carry out a delicate mission in the Slavic Republic of the East, where a very violent civil war is raging led by a group of rebels. These rebels have managed to seize the evolved Plagas virus, which can turn humans into zombies that can be commanded at will. The oligarchic government of the Slavic Republic of the East, led by President Svetlana Borikova, fights the rebels without exception, with the aim of becoming the sole possessors of the lethal virus. Leon, left alone in a foreign land due to the retreat of the American army, will seek to discover what lies behind Svetlana's political maneuver before helping the rebels achieve their goal. With "Resident Evil: Damnation" we are presented with a feature film entirely realized in computer graphics thanks to the collaboration between the programmers of Capcom and Sony Pictures Entertainment Japan, with the aim of creating a prequel for the video game "Resident Evil 6". Thus returns to the direction the Japanese Makoto Kamiya, who had already dealt previously with "Resident Evil: Degeneration"; on this occasion we find some characters surely dear to the fans of the Capcom video game such as Leon Scott Kennedy, present in "Resident Evil 2" and "Resident Evil 4", and Claire Redfield who play the role of real protagonists of the entire story. The main problem of this work is that all the characters present are characterized in a very marginal way, thus leaving the viewer almost indifferent to all the events that go beyond pure violence. This film tells the perennial struggle between good and evil in which good always manages to prevail, albeit with great difficulty; the tension leaves much to be desired while giving a lot of space to notable computer graphics effects regarding the various monsters that populate the entire film. Thus begins an endless flight of the protagonists, combined with an exhausting hunt for the monster that continues without pause for almost all 96 minutes of the film's duration. Of undoubted interest, however, is the plot that serves as a corollary to the various violent scenes, in which a picture of political corruption, always very current and interesting, intersects with the individual stories of the various subjects; it is a real shame that these points remain as they are without being explored, thus leaving a sense of incompleteness. The various scenes set in closed environments lack details, especially regarding the movements of the characters' hair, as well as their clothes; a completely different discussion must be made for the scenes in open environments that are clear and very well defined even on the horizon line. "Resident Evil: Damnation" is therefore a film that will interest almost exclusively the devotees of the Capcom video game and can be interpreted only as a long introduction to the next chapter of the saga, since throughout the duration of the film it is really noticeable the desire to grab a joystick to be able to command the various characters.