Though it didn't release online afterwards, unfortunately, the first teaser trailer for Zach Cregger's Resident Evil reboot screened for those in attendance during Sony's CinemaCon presentation last night.
We'll probably be waiting a while to see the footage for ourselves, but an official title logo was released, and we have some breakdowns of what was shown.
Screen Rant writes:
"Star Austin Abrams is seen walking in the snow before knocking on the door of a house. The door opens, and Abrams asks to use the phone because of car troubles. When he calls, it goes to voicemail. Abrams is then seen running into the barn, searching for weapons. He finds a body. Then Abrams is in a sewer and sees a person sitting there. He's seen running into the snow again and locking zombies in a room. Abrams is then seen in a city where bodies are dropping from skyscrapers and falling onto parked cars."
And here's Variety's description:
"The trailer starts out with Austin Abrams’ character stumbling upon an abandoned house in a snowy field, desperate to find a working phone. He frantically calls his girlfriend and apologizes for getting disconnected earlier — and that they may never speak again. Shots of horrifying zombies fill the rest of the trailer, including a pale, bloated monster sitting at the bottom of a sewer. The biggest moment of the trailer comes when Abrams is running through a deserted street as a zombie horde chases him from the rooftops. It ends with zombie bodies splattering violently as the creatures plummet to the ground."
A test-screening for the movie was held recently, and while the feedback (via World of Reel) was positive, Cregger's take is said to have "practically nothing to do with the games, aside from a few Easter eggs and some recognizable monsters."
"Early word is that Cregger hasn’t just made another video game adaptation — he’s delivered something lean, mean, and very confident. The runtime is 90 minutes, and it’s apparently all gas, no brakes. The film is said to be almost entirely built around tension. One attendee I spoke to called it a horror version of Fury Road."
"The scope is also small and contained," WOR adds. "Instead of a sprawling mythology, Cregger keeps the cast tight and the focus narrow. There’s almost zero world-building. Early reactions say it’s far more cinematic than previous Resident Evil movies, with strong visual framing and practical effects doing most of the work."
During a recent interview with The New York Times, Cregger said that he fully expects fans to "crucify" him if he does anything to alter the source material.
“I love the idea of being pitted against a world that is hellbent on annihilating you. It just feels fun and I haven’t seen a movie that offers that sort of experience," he added.
The last Resident Evil feature was Johannes Roberts' (47 Meters Down, The Strangers: Prey at Night) Welcome to Racoon City starring Kaya Scodelario (Crawl) as Claire Redfield, Hannah John-Kamen (Ant-Man and the Wasp) as Jill Valentine, and Robbie Amell (Upload) as Chris Redfield. It was not well-received by fans or critics.
More recently, a live-action Resident Evil series starring the late Lance Reddick (John Wick, The Wire) as Albert Wesker was released on Netflix, and that was met with an even worse reception.
With this in mind, maybe straying from the source material isn't such a bad idea as long as Cregger delivers where these earlier adaptations failed?
The new movie's official synopsis reads:
From the mind of visionary filmmaker Zach Cregger comes a thrilling—and terrifying—reinvention of the RESIDENT EVIL franchise. In an all-new story, RESIDENT EVIL follows Bryan (Austin Abrams; pictured), a medical courier who unwittingly finds himself in an action-packed, non-stop race for survival, as one fateful, horrifying night collapses into chaos around him.