Resident Evil

Paul W. S. Anderson’s 2002 film unfolds inside an underground complex sealed by its own artificial intelligence after a virus escapes, trapping the team with the results. This is one of several versions that might have existed. George A. Romero wrote five or six drafts using the game’s own cast; all were turned down. Robert Kulzer of the production said the script was good but would have carried an NC-17 rating, and a film built on the first game risked looking dated once the second shipped. Anderson came in with a spec script he cheerfully called a rip off. For anyone who knows the series, the key fact is that Jill, Chris and Wesker are absent by design. Anderson argued that the tension of who lives, who dies and where loyalties lie could work only with characters the audience had never met. Alice was written for that job. The production was based around Berlin: the Adlershof studios, the Bundestag underground station, the Krampnitz barracks, Schloss Lindstedt. The American corporate campus on screen was assembled from German locations. A good fit if the enclosed set pieces invented for the film, the laser corridor above all, are what you want. Not for a player expecting the names and the running order from the source: that cast was deliberately left out.