Concealing the relationship between monopoly capital and the labor aristocracy:

"Resident Evil: Apocalypse"

"Resident Evil: Apocalypse" (http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/residentevilap ocalypse/) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0318627/)
Directed by Alexander Witt
R / UK:15
2004

Reviewed by a contributor

The flesh-eating zombies created by the all-powerful Umbrella Corporation's artificial T-virus are running rampant in Raccoon City. Police personnel, a weather reporter and a supermodel—er—newly superhumyn former covert operative try to escape the carnage. They run into a really scary remote-controlled monster who used to be a humyn in the first "Resident Evil" movie.

In terms of artistic criteria, "Resident Evil: Apocalypse" is in several ways worse than its predecessor, "Resident Evil" (2002) (or "Ground Zero"). But that would be a problem only if "Apocalypse" represented an advance over other evil-corporation movies politically. Exactly why "Apocalypse" is artistically bad isn't really interesting. It is enough to know that it's bad. In fact, the fact that people in the audience were laughing all throughout this clichéd zombie movie's silliness may make the movie's bad politics easier to stomach.

Let's get the good stuff out of the way. "Apocalypse" continues the theoretically limited evil-corporation theme, but goes further than "Ground Zero" in caricaturing the relationship between monopoly capitalism and the imperialist state. It is made excruciatingly clear that the government of Raccoon City is dominated by the Umbrella Corporation. This fictional plot is not too far from the truth, reflecting part of the real-world relationship between monopoly capitalists and the imperialist state, and even part of the relationship between capitalists and the capitalist state more generally.

In an abstract, but realistic, sense, all localities within a capitalist country are ideologically and politically dominated by capitalists to the extent that there is no movement away from the capitalist system, but there are specific ways by which capitalists are able to retain and wield state power. "Apocalypse" illustrates this in the relationship between the Umbrella Corporation and the government of Raccoon City, which is located in an imperialist democracy. Even though Raccoon City residents had voting rights, they did nothing to stop the Umbrella Corporation from gaining dominance, and Raccoon City allowed Umbrella Corporation to take concrete steps toward its current position of supremacy.

Like the Umbrella Corporation, different factions of capitalists in the real world are able to control migration to and from regions as best serves their particular interests. In the movie, Raccoon City literally has city gates controlled by the Umbrella Corporation.

"Apocalypse" is marginally better than other evil-corporation movies in that the Umbrella Corporation, while a single company, could be interpreted as a metaphor for highly concentrated u.$. monopoly capital in general, rather than, say, an individual pharmaceutical or tobacco company. As an evil corporation, the Umbrella Corporation is not made out to be an exception to the supposed rule of ethical monopoly capitalists. With the exception of the major news media, there are no other monopoly capitalists in sight. As the face of monopoly capital, the Umbrella Corporation is the rule, not an exception to the rule.

While Raccoon City, which appears to be Toronto, is not exactly a company town, "Apocalypse" also raises the possibility of single companies dominating local governments. In fact, company towns, in some form, still exist in North Amerika(1), and local government corruption by companies exists and is widespread in both imperialist countries and the Third World. Although illegal bribery and other practices, and all sorts of strong-arming, are not the only forms that capitalist influence in government can take (a government can easily support capitalism by following the law, especially when it is capitalists who make the laws), "Apocalypse" is correct to point out that individual capitalists are not above breaking the laws that ensure the survival of capital as a whole. Plus, with the Umbrella Corporation as an Amerikan enterprise, it's not just "rogue nations" who are breaking the laws.(2)

The idea of a company using viruses to do secret physiological experiments and create supersoldiers in labs looks to be incredible in "Apocalypse." This actually obscures some of the movie's more interesting points. In fact, u.$. government agencies and other institutions are no strangers to conducting harmful biological experiments on unwitting or captive populations.(3)

The Umbrella Corporation uses nuclear weaponry at one point in the movie. While this reviewer persynally doubts that imperialist-country parasites would ever vote for a government or other entity that might turn on them with nuclear weapons, stories of Operation Northwoods notwithstanding(4), "Apocalypse" also indirectly raises the issue of humyn radiation experimentation by the u.$. government.(5) People would have to know about these things already, going into the theater, so "Apocalypse" doesn't really add anything to the public's understanding of criminal humyn experimentation by imperialist institutions. In reality, the souped-up zombie-movie "Apocalypse" may even serve to put claims of criminal humyn experimentation in a ridiculous light. This is a long-term effect of the movie that depends on similar movies or other productions being made.

To the extent that "Apocalypse" does create some public anxiety about humyn experimentation by the military-industrial complex, it deserves praise. There are reports of the drug LSD being used in past research to improve troop performance(6), and the united $tates is openly looking for ways to enhance soldiers' physical abilities by equipping them with different technologies, including drugs(7). "Humanist" concern for the overall health of imperialist troops is not the point here, but, rather, the lengths that imperialists are willing to go to prolong the brutal system of national oppression, and prevent the body bags and coffins from coming home and showing up on the evening news. These measures that the united $tates is taking represent the death rattle of u.$. imperialist hegemony.

What's wrong with this movie

We are told at the beginning of the first "Resident Evil" movie that "at the beginning of the twenty-first century, the Umbrella Corporation had become the largest commercial entity in the United States." Most households use UC products, and UC has great political and financial influence. Arguably, General Electric occupies a similar position in the real world, and it is further interesting that General Electric and the fictional Umbrella Corporation of the "Resident Evil" world have both been involved in the nuclear weapons industry.(8) GE and UC's business and consumer product lines are similar. GE's business product line even includes medical equipment.

It is not that the evil-corporation theme now common in imperialist- country movies is a bad thing in and of itself. It is correct to demonize monopoly capitalists. What's wrong with "Apocalypse" is that is represents no improvement over earlier movies dealing with the idea of powerful corporations. By failing to go into more detail than earlier evil- corporation movies, "Apocalypse" ends up representing the single, most powerful corporation as the only threat. And like several earlier evil- corporation movies, "Apocalypse" pointlessly depicts differences between "bad cops" and "good cops."

"Apocalypse" joins the ranks of evil-corporation movies that end up falsely opposing monopoly capital to the interests of the majority of the u.$. population, when, in fact, the majority of u.$. enterprises and the u.$. population, and the Euro-Amerikan nation in particular, benefit from both capitalism and imperialism. These movies include "Blade Runner" (1982), "Brazil" (1985), "RoboCop" (1987), and, more recently, "Paycheck" (2003) and "The Manchurian Candidate" (2004). What all of these particular movies also have in common is a tendency to glorify the heroism of police workers. "Apocalypse" does not differ from earlier evil- corporation movies in this respect and even goes as far as victimizing members of the Umbrella Corporation's heavily armed Special Tactics and Rescue Services (S.T.A.R.S.), municipal police, and also members of the imperialist media. In the real world, "good cops" are rare and are usually confined to whistle-blowers who crop up now and then to save face for pigs everywhere, and so- called community police who excel at being "friendly" and camouflaging their repressive function.(9)

The police sergeant Peyton Wells (played by Razaaq Adoti, who is Nigerian) seems to be some kind of improvement over the comedic Black man, L.J. (Mike Epps), first seen as a detainee in the police station and who owns "custom" handguns. He lucks out when the zombies attack the police station and distract the officers. L.J. develops as a character by later allying with the police. "Apocalypse" never questions why there are police in Raccoon City in the first place.

Gender issues

Because of the T-virus, the character Alice (Milla Jovovich) is extremely powerful physically. It would be difficult to say that this is another instance of pseudo-feminism in movie culture. Images of solitary heroines or powerful female protagonists do not automatically mean pseudo- feminism. There is no sense that Alice is even trying or claiming to fight patriarchy, and Alice is represented as being an abnormality, her artificial physical abilities unattainable for most people in general. In other words, nothing Alice does represents any kind of strategy, correct or incorrect, for resisting patriarchy. Other female characters, such as the weather reporter Terri Morales, seem contemptibly weak in comparison with Alice, which is not particularly helpful for gender-oppressed wimmin or even gender oppressors with female biology. Even as Alice is physically the strongest character in the movie, she seems to be psychologically unstable like the zombies with uncontrolled T-virus infections.

What we can say is that "Apocalypse" provides no clarity on what gender oppression means(10). Although, it is interesting to see how the prominent child character in the movie, Dr. Ashford's daughter, Angie (Sophie Vavasseur), behaves (eerily, more calmly and rationally than most of the adult characters). Dr. Ashford's affection for Angie is touching in a sentimental and superficial way, but serves to obscure the oppression of children under patriarchy.(11)

The ending of "Apocalypse" leaves open the possibility of a third movie, so there is some potential for improvement. Versions of "Resident Evil" movies made in a socialist people's republic would make clear what the Umbrella Corporation's "military technology" is used for: wars with other imperialist countries, and wars against exploited and oppressed people. We would see strong female characters who do not have adjustment problems, and the police would put civilians at risk to save their own lives.

As is, "Resident Evil: Apocalypse" deserves a neutral rating for doing extremely little to change the status quo.

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Notes

1. Alynda Wheat and Ellen Florian, "Company Town," Fortune, http://www.fortune.com/fortune/specials/2003/0414/ tow_intro.html

2. Examples from the health care industry in both the united $tates and Kanada abound. Less acknowledged are the illegal practices of imperialist-country arms manufacturers who would be much smaller than the movie's Umbrella Corporation. "Arms Manufacturers Allegedly Bending The Rules," IndustryWeek, July 28, 2000, http://www.industryweek.com/DailyPage/newsitem.asp ?id=2288 ; Leigh, Day & Co., "Arms sales to Indonesia - are they illegal?," December 10, 2003, http://www.leighday.co.uk/doc.asp?doc=325&cat=849< /p>

3. Sherman, Silverstein, Kohl, Rose & Podolsky, P.A., "Bioethics issues," http://www.sskrplaw.com/bioethics/chronology.html ; Larry Bernard, "Historian examines U.S. ethics in Nuremberg Medical Trial tactics," Cornell University News Service, December 5, 1996, http://www.news.cornell.edu/Chronicle/96/12.5.96/N uremberg.html ; Julie Taitsman, Spring, 1998, "Regulation of informed consent in human subject research: past, present, and future," http://leda.law.harvard.edu/leda/search/toc.php3?h andle=HLS.Library.Leda/taitsmanj- regulation_informed_consent

4. David Ruppe, "Friendly Fire," May 1, 2001, ABCNEWS.com, http://abcnews.go.com/sections/us/DailyNews/jointc hiefs_010501.html ; John Pilger, "What America needed was a 'new Pearl Harbor'," http://site.www.umb.edu/faculty/salzman_g/Strate/D iscus/2002-12-12ANewPearlHarbor.htm

5. U.S. Department of Energy, DOE Openness: Human Radiation Experiments, http://www.eh.doe.gov/ohre/ ; Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments, http://biotech.law.lsu.edu/research/reports/ACHRE/ ; Lori L. Hefner, "The Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory's Archives and Records Office's Role in the US Department of Energy's Human Radiation Experiment Records Search and Retrieval Project," http://www.asap.unimelb.edu.au/asa/stama/stama_aus /news/2-doe.htm ; Arjun Makhijani, "Energy Enters Guilty Plea," Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, May, 1994, http://www.bullatomsci.org/issues/1994/ma94/ma94Ma khijani.html ; David Pacchioli, "Subjected to Science," Research/Penn State, 17(1), http://www.rps.psu.edu/mar96/science.html

6. For example: Jonathan D. Moreno, "Lessons Learned A Half-Century of Experimenting on Humans - U.S. Army experiments," Humanist, September, 1999, http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1374/is _5_59/ai_55722247

7. John Jansen, Brad Richardson, Francois Pin, Randy Lind, and Joe Birdwell, September, 2000, "Exoskeleton for Soldier Enhancement Systems Feasibility Study," http://www.ornl.gov/~webworks/cpr/rpt/108469_.pdf ; Chloe Veltman, "Nanotech future for soldiers," BBC News, September 21, 2001, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1554130.stm ; "Drug cuts need for sleep," BBC News, August 13, 2002, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2191324.stm ; "Bionic legs give soldiers a boost ," BBC News, March 11, 2004, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3502194.stm

8. Darrell G. Moen, "Deadly Deception: General Electric, Nuclear Weapons, and our Environment," http://www.tsujiru.net/moen/video_trans/012.html ; "Who Owns What: General Electric," Columbia Journalism Review, http://www.cjr.org/tools/owners/ge.asp

9. Neil Websdale, Policing the Poor : From Slave Plantation to Public Housing, Boston, Northeastern University Press, 2001, http://www.atsweb.neu.edu/nupress- cgi/nupress.cgi?action=more_info&id=367 ; "33.2 Neil Websdale. Policing the Poor: From Slave Plantation to Public Housing," SSSP Newsletter, 33(2), http://www.sssp1.org/index.cfm?FuseAction=page.mai n&tsmi=148&pageID=151&detailID=702

10. MC5, "Clarity on what gender is," http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/wim/cong/gender9 8b.html

11. MCB52, "The Oppression of Children Under Patriarchy," http://www.prisoncensorship.info/archive/etext/mt/mt9child.html