The new Resident Evil movie is coming, and there was one aspect of the movie that director Zach Cregger admitted he stole from another movie. The new Resident Evil movie has a lot of hype behind it thanks to Cregger’s last two movies being unmitigated successes, with Barbarian a huge cult hit and Weapons actually winning an Oscar. The former sketch comedy star from The Whitest Kids U Know has now become one of the hottest in-demand horror directors working today, and seeing what he can do with the video game franchise is intriguing. Even more interesting is that he stole from a non-horror movie when it comes to the aesthetic here.
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In an interview with Empire for its August issue, Cregger referenced the snowy setting of his Resident Evil movie. He said it was taken from the Coen brothers’ Fargo. “It might be my favorite movie, and there are some serious Fargo homages in Resident Evil. In fact, there’s one shot that I took directly from it,” Cregger said.
Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil Looks to Reinvent the Movie Franchise
It is unclear what specific scene Cregger lifted from Fargo, but that should be something fun for film fans to look for in his movie. Of course, that original movie was a conman movie taking place in the snowy landscape of Minnesota. However, Resident Evil will be nothing like that Coen brothers film, and it seems like Cregger might just be basing the look of the film’s scene on that 1990s cult classic.
Paul W.S. Anderson’s Resident Evil movies have their fans. Milla Jovovich was a great female action hero, and the entire franchise just went off the rails in all the best ways for fans of wild action horror movies. However, while Cregger is someone who likes to add a bit of humor in his horror movies to balance out the violence and gore that he also loves, it doesn’t look like he is going to go all out as Anderson did. In the same interview, though, Cregger said not to mistake it for a film like Weapons or Barbarian.
“It’s a lot more of a straightforward down-and-dirty horror ride than Weapons and Barbarian,” Cregger said. “I get to play with a palette that I hadn’t really gotten to play with before, which is to lean into just visceral stuff all the way through.”
This makes it sound like it will be much more action-packed, but there have also been comments by star Austin Abrams, who said there are some very funny moments in the film. That said, this isn’t going to be anything like Weapons’ humor, which was dark and disturbing and played well with the more methodical storytelling. Instead, this seems like a movie that will add humor in small doses without ever slowing down once. In a previous interview, Cregger said that the movie kicks into high gear five minutes in and never slows down.
The Anderson Resident Evil movie started with a genuine horror movie in the first outing before eventually becoming a huge spectacle of CGI monsters and explosions. Based on the trailer from Cregger’s movie, it looks more like this movie will just be a full onslaught of monsters attacking humans, and the fight for survival. There is no indication that Cregger will go full CGI, and his past movies show he loves practical effects a little too much to do so.
Even better is that Cregger also said in the interview that the audience will follow someone who has no combat skills and is inept at survival, which means it is a normal person. This should let movie fans see themselves in his shoes, rather than just watching a genetically modified superwoman fighting deadly monsters. If anything, it sounds like this might finally give Resident Evil video game fans the scary film they always wanted.
Resident Evil is scheduled to be released in theaters on September 18, 2026.
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