Milla Jovovich: Closing The Book With Resident Evil: The Final Chapter

By Gill Pringle

Did you feel very emotional filming the last film in the series? This has been your life for fifteen years… “Yeah, it was. It was also emotional having my daughter on set. She plays The Red Queen, and being in the same scenes with her was very emotional. This whole experience has been such a huge part of my life, not even just as an actor, but on a personal level. My husband and I met through this, and we’ve had two kids now. It’s the family that evil built… literally! [Laughs] But we’re good people, and yeah, it is very emotional. It’s hard having to say goodbye to Alice. She has been such a part of my life, and she’s grown as I’ve grown, and I’ve been inspired by her. I feel like she’s changed as I’ve changed. It’s quite surreal thinking that this is the end.”

You had to postpone the shoot because of your second pregnancy? “Yes, because we were meant to start filming and I got pregnant. I couldn’t imagine doing all the stunts [Laughs]. Also, I didn’t want to have my stunt double do everything. I gained so much weight with both my pregnancies that I think half of the special effects budget would’ve gone into making me look normal. So it felt right to postpone it, but it was definitely very scary having to call the studio and all the producers. Paul was literally about to leave to start prep the day after, and we’re sitting there thinking, ‘Are we seriously going to do this?’ Even before I really start showing, if anything happens to me, if anything happens to the baby, we’d never forgive ourselves. No movie is worth it. At this point, it’s more important for us to stay solid, as a couple, and as a family, than to have something happen during an action film that could potentially put me or my unborn child in danger. It’s just not worth it.”

 Was the second pregnancy a total surprise then? “Yes, it was. We’ve wanted to get pregnant, and our older daughter had been asking for a baby for a couple of years. Once you get past 35, it gets more difficult, and we didn’t want a baby right away because we really wanted to enjoy our daughter and give her 100%, but it turned out the way that it did, which is great because it’s a great age difference. She’s super happy and there’s no jealousy or anything like that.”

Was it difficult, after having your second daughter? Were you under pressure to get right into the gym so filming could resume? “Yeah, for sure. I did Zoolander 2 right after, so we went with the family to Rome when she was 2 months old, and it was tough. My body was still completely in flux. It was hard getting into the skin tight outfits and just feeling not prepared for that. But it was a lot of fun. Then, of course, we did that, and then pretty much had to go to South Africa straight after. In the end, I did it right. I was on a very strict diet, and I was in the gym every day, but I ended up still nursing for ten months. It was a challenge, but I persevered…I was pumping milk every two hours. I’d be dressed as Alice with blood and dirt everywhere, and I’d be like, ‘Okay guys, one second.’ It would be funny because my outfit would change, and my boobs would expand every few hours. There are shots where my boobs are huge! I’d be shooting, and I’d be like, ‘Paul, I really need to go back to the trailer’ and he’d be like, ‘No, but it looks great, let’s just shoot one more shot.’ [Laughs] This is like the first Alice with boobs.”

What can we expect in terms of action? Is there something new? “There is a really new style of action, which I’m quite proud of. One of our stunt choreographers, Nathan Barris, a very talented South African guy, was doing professional parkour when he was young. I mean he’s still young – he’s in his late 20s – but when he was a kid, he used to do this. I said, ‘Nathan, why isn’t there any parkour in the film? I’m sure that Paul would love it if you came up with something. That’s your history, that’s where you come from, that’s your passion. Why don’t we have something like that where Alice does parkour?’ So he called this friend of his who’s this professional competition parkour girl. I can’t remember her name, but she was amazing, and they came up with this great sequence. There’s a scene where we’re in a glass corridor with lasers coming, and now Alice is flipping of walls and using the set around her in these really novel ways to escape the lasers. It’s phenomenal.”

Every film is a new journey, and in this film, you’ve got some new friends along the way, like Ruby Rose… “We’ve always been really lucky working on the Resident Evil films, because we’ve always managed to get really interesting people to join the cast…people who love the games, and love the movies. Ruby and [fellow co-star] Eoin Macken are both just lovely people. They are serious and driven, but they’re a lot of fun to be around. When you’re shooting sixteen-hour days, with night shoots and it’s freezing and there are stunts, it can be challenging, to say the least. So it’s really important to have positive energy around you. Ruby was amazing; she was always smiling and laughing and having fun. That’s the thing that saves you when you feel like, ‘Oh my god, I can’t take this anymore! It’s freezing! I’ve been running all night, and I’m exhausted.’ You need people around who are going to motivate you to do it again rather than people that get into bad moods, and start acting like divas. People get frustrated and start lashing out at the crew and their co-stars and things. It’s nice just to have a cast that is just as motivated and isn’t gonna play the diva card and isn’t going to be spoiled brats on set.”

Will we see a future collaboration between you and Ruby, because I know she’s musical too… “Oh gosh, I would love that. Ruby’s amazing, and we got along so well. I’m sure that at some point, we’ll do something together.”

Would you be interested in making a video game based off the movies? I know the movies are based off the video games, but they’ve taken different paths. Would you like to see Alice in the video games? “I would love to. I’ve always been very open to Alice being part of the games. That would be really interesting. I know one of the reasons that Paul didn’t want to use a video game character for the film is that he wanted more freedom to write a story and take the characters into places without having to always have to get an okay from the video game company. There’s only so much that you can do with the characters that everybody knows and everybody loves. So we were able to get a bit more freedom with Alice than we’d have with a Jill Valentine or a Claire Redfield.”

What is evil for you? Something that you like that is prohibited? “After two kids, it’s like everything that you eat is evil. Every time that you eat a burger or donut, it’s like, ‘Okay, back to the gym.’ Once you’ve had kids, everything that tastes good is evil. But you know: good for the soul, bad for the butt.”

Resident Evil: The Final Chapter is released in cinemas on January 26. Click through for our interview with the film’s director, Paul W.S. Anderson.