Blu-ray Movie Reviews

A zombie attack brings chaos to Harvardville Airport. Leon S. Kennedy and Claire Redfield who fought the sinister Umbrella Corporation during the Raccoon City tragedy 7 years ago, are back. In high-octane Resident Evil style, they're ready to battle a rogue warrior who is seeking revenge after his family was killed in Raccoon City. The deadly G-Virus is unleashed and a new mutated monster goes on the rampage. Will Claire and Leon be able to terminate the virus before history repeats itself?

Rather than add to the popular live action film series, Degeneration seems to be of a continuation of the popular video games series the films were inspired by. The film is done in CG and the animation style is a nice step up from the cut scenes we see in the games but not quite to the overall level we see in other big budget CG animation. Capcom has done a great job with environments and technical details but the character animations fall a bit short whenever talking is involved. The storyline is pretty simple; a strain of the T-Virus seems to have been leaked but the pharmaceutical company that is being blamed actually has a vaccine. Now it is up to Leon and Claire to find out what is really going on. While I am sure fans of the game will probably enjoy this addition, I found it weak as a standalone film. The pacing is a bit slow and it just didn’t seem to bring anything really new to the table.

Sony has done a great job with the HD presentation though the animation style has some shortcomings. The most obvious issues are line twitter and some light shimmering. This is readily apparent in the most fine detail and can be distracting at times. Otherwise the CG holds up pretty well. The character animations are distracting during conversations and the dubbing is slightly off. Fine object detail is excellent though and contrast is strong. The image has a very dimensional look and depth of image is generally strong. While not a reference animation piece, it is still quite good for what it is.

The 5.1 Dolby TrueHD lossless mix is also good but falls short in production value. There is plenty of action to keep things going but overall dynamics were a bit lacking. Sure there is plenty of low bass but the separation of elements in the mix is a bit weak and just comes off as loud at times. The soundstage has a nice open quality to it and surround use is impressive at times. The voice work is bland and reminds me more of a video game than a feature film.

This title is Bonusview enabled and gives you a look at the film from different stages of production including motion capture and rendering. There is also a pop-up trivia track for fans of the game and backstory. There is a feature on the production along with the trailers. For fans of the game there is an inside look at the upcoming fifth installment including a trailer.

While the presentation is pretty solid for this one I would have to recommend it only to fans of the video game series. At times it was hard to follow without knowledge of the backstory and I didn’t find the film overly involving.