WARNING: The following contains spoilers for Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, in theaters now.
Directed by Johannes Roberts, Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City reboots the long-running horror film series. The 2021 film is based on the first two Resident Evil video games and shows Raccoon City plagued by a virus that transforms people into flesh-chomping zombies. It's up to a small band of locals -- Claire (Kaya Scodelario), Chris (Robbie Amell), Jill (Hannah John-Kamen), Leon (Avan Jogia), and Wesker (Tom Hopper) -- to expose the Umbrella Corp's nefarious experiments and somehow survive a night of the living undead.
Resident Evil's Amell spoke to CBR about his love of the franchise and its gnarly zombies. Amell also detailed what went into his portrayal of Chris Redfield and teased future sequels.
CBR: As a massive gamer, what struck you about the Resident Evil video games?
Robbie Amell: One of my first video-game memories was playing the game in the dark, and the dogs jumping through the window and scaring the hell out of me. It's a very vivid memory. It was one of the first games post-Super Mario Bros. If you look back, the graphics are terrible, but at the time, I was like, "Wow! Look how real this looks." It was the first horror game I can remember playing. It was an introduction to zombies for me a little bit, so it was pivotal for my childhood.
Why do you feel so many movie adaptations of video games fail?
It's a fine line of delivering on what the fans want to see and giving a fresh take. The other thing is in a lot of games, the cut scenes aren't built to be great movie scenes. A lot of what die-hard fans, like myself, find missing is connective tissue. You really need somebody who is a fan of the games, who has played the games, and really understands the heart and soul of what makes the games so great. When I met director Johannes Roberts, it was so clear to me that he was the right guy for this and was such a fan of the games.
When we first met over Zoom, we geeked out about the games and his adaptation of it and what he was keeping almost shot-for-shot -- like the first time I see the white-coat zombie, as he turns over his shoulder. The police station or the Spencer Mansion -- he got blueprints from Capcom for those. What I thought he did so well was he built these characters and gave them flaws and made these relationships between them. That connective tissue gave you something to see. The audience can see reflections of themselves. They can relate to these characters.
The narrative dives into these characters more than the game. Introduce us to Chris and where we meet him at the beginning of the movie.
When you first meet him, Claire has broken into his house. Chris hasn't seen her in a long time. He's immediately defensive because he doesn't like the way things ended with Claire. She's always coming by for the wrong reasons. Chris probably should have left this small town a long time ago, but he hasn't. He’s trying to make the best of what he has. He doesn't have any real family left. He doesn't have a whole lot going for him. He's a small-town hero, who is stuck in this shitty town that is going to hell. I think there's regret with how he handled things with Claire. There's a little bit of anger with how she handled things with him. When they were kids, he didn't expect her to leave, and then she was gone. Johannes did a nice job of having them come to terms with decisions you make or things that happen to you as a child.
What's cool is I knew we were going to have zombie-killing Chris because that’s another important part of the character. I knew I was going to have those scenes to have fun with, but it was nice to see this character from the games -- who is probably a little bit flat and more one-dimensional -- as more of a human being.
What were some of the moments where it felt like you were actually standing in the game?
Spencer Mansion.
The first time I walked into the foyer, or the lobby area was unbelievable. I've walked through that part of the game a thousand times. To be standing there, surrounded by the rest of the cast, was a surreal pinch-me moment I will never forget. The White Coat Zombie, leaning over his shoulder, that's the first zombie you meet in the video games. The scene was done so well. The lab… There's a bunch of green and red and blue herbs on the wall, which as a fan of the game, it's so obvious and so simple. It's nice to have that type of stuff in there. In the dining room, where I have that fight scene, there's a picture of two knights fighting on the wall behind me, which is straight out of the game. Every other day, there was something new to discover. I was like, "Shit. This is so cool and straight out of the game."
Even his wardrobe is truer to the video game as opposed to the slicker look seen in previous movies.
My first wardrobe fitting was during COVID-19, so they came to my condo. My wife is sitting there, and we are trying on a bunch of different clothes and vests. Then they brought this green, Vietnam flat jacket out of this special area. [They asked], "Why don't we try this one on?" I put it on and was like, "Wow. Of course. This is it." Johannes loved it. I know they sent everything to Capcom for notes. Every character had some tweaks to make. The notes for mine came back and were, "Nothing. He looks just like Chris Redfield."
The only thing we didn't stick with is the hunting knife on the chest. It's such a big knife. It works for a video game, but in real life, the handle was hitting me in the face. It just didn't work. It's on my waist, which is more reasonable.
Chris is on his own quite a bit and in the dark battling the infected. How was it filming those sequences?
The fight scene in the dining room, only lit by my flash, was a total nerd moment for me. It was me and 10 zombie players dressed as zombies. We spent a day choreographing and rehearsing. Then, we spent a full day shooting it. A lot of it was done in an oner and then, there were little snippets of additions. The lighter scene was a reshoot that Johannes really liked and had in his head. He pitched it to Sony and they were like, "That is awesome." I came back for two days of reshoots and it was that, plus little, tiny connective tissue for a couple of other scenes. We shot that lighter thing in half a day. They had five lighters that they had to hand on and off because they would get so hot. It turned out great.
Even though that sequence was tightly choreographed, you are essentially in the dark and lashing out at zombies coming at you. Were there any mishaps? Do have any battle scars?
I got a four or five-inch-long scar on my arm that has just faded now, a year later. It wasn't even in the dark scene. It was when I'm by the stairwell and there are three zombies grabbing at my arms. I am trying to defend myself. We were all just going for it, but I got a fingernail through my arm. It took a full crater scrape. I had so much fake blood on my arm that you couldn't tell it had happened until I had washed up that evening. It was pretty solid for the first few months and then it was a scar for a little while after that.
The Resident Evil zombies are iconic. What was your impression of those ghouls and the first time you interacted with them?
If you take the zombies straight out of the first game, it will leave a little to be desired. You can run past them in a room, no problem. It was finding that balance of, "We want these things to feel dangerous and scary, but you still want them to feel like the video game." It was great that it was always stunt players because they could give a little more and take a harder hit than most actors would be safely willing to do.
For instance, in that fight scene in the dining hall, they are all making me look way more badass than I should. Respect to all of them for what they did. It made everything feel authentic and scarier. Then, they call, "Cut," and you see one drinking a Coke. "All right. Not that scary anymore."
Welcome to Raccoon City serves as an origin story. What kind of discussions did you have about sequels and continuing Chris' adventures?
I would have taken this movie sight unseen. Lucky for me, it was a great script, with great people involved. I would love to keep doing it. I know Johannes has talked a little about Resident Evil: Code Veronica and Resident Evil 4 as things he'd like to pull from. At the end of the day, it's a business. As long as the first one is successful, they'll want to do a second one. Fingers crossed we get a nice opening weekend.
What was your favorite zombie from the movie?
Sadly, I don't have a scene with the Licker. It's creepy, fast, and scary. If you were like, "Which one do you not want to face in a zombie encounter," the Licker is at the top of that list. The dogs were great. They are really well-trained Dobermans. They were terrifying. There's no acting needed when you have those things drooling and snarling at you.