Movies
Zach Cregger Compares His Austin Abrams-Led ‘Resident Evil’ Movie to ‘Evil Dead 2’
Up next from Zach Cregger (Barbarian, Weapons) is a fresh new take on the Resident Evil film franchise with an untitled movie that’ll be the filmmaker’s follow-up to Weapons, which just raised his horror credibility even further. Cregger has teased that his Resident Evil movie won’t be shackled by the video game franchise’s lore, and we’ve got more teases this week.
Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil will be the eighth live action movie based on the hit video games, but Cregger admits in a chat with Ringer Movies that he’s never actually seen any of the previous movies. His vision for Resident Evil, it seems, is going to be quite original.
Cregger tells Ringer, “It’s gonna be not at all like Barbarian and Weapons. It’s going to be a rock ’em, sock ’em… it’s for me to play. And turn my brain off and just make an… Evil Dead 2… get crazy with the camera. Austin Abrams is gonna be my guy. It’s a weird, fun, wild story.”
“This movie follows a person from point A to point B. It’s like a real time journey, where you just go deeper and deeper into the depths of Hell,” Cregger continues. “And it’s really a love letter to the games. Because I love those games. This is a story that I would’ve wanted to write whether I got the IP or not. I just happen to be able to have these Resident Evil people be down. So I get to play in that sandbox. I’m doing it because I think this movie is going to be fucking awesome.”
“I consider Resident Evil an original thing,” the filmmaker notes. “And I think you will too when you see it.”
What does Cregger mean by that? Well, he recently told SFX Magazine that his movie will not be “completely obedient to the lore of the games,” but rather he’s trying to tell “a story that just feels authentic to the experience you get when you play the games.” And he tells Inverse in a separate chat that the movie won’t feature any characters from the Resident Evil games.
“Let me say this: this is not breaking the rules of the games,” Cregger tells Inverse. “I am the biggest worshiper of the games, so I’m telling a story that is a love letter to the games and follows the rules of the games.” Cregger continues in the same chat, “I’m not going to tell Leon’s story, because Leon’s story is told in the games. [Fans] already have that.”
After seven live action movies and a short-lived Netflix television series, Constantin Film and PlayStation Productions are bringing Resident Evil back to the big screen, with Cregger writing and directing. Zach Cregger’s Resident Evil hits theaters September 18, 2026.
Judging from the unprecedented box office success of Kane Parsons’ Backrooms adaptation, you’ve likely already seen the liminal horror hit that managed to make audiences afraid of empty hallways and bad wallpaper. And now that so many of us have already entered the yellow labyrinth (some of us more than once), the time has come to discuss the spoiler-filled details that make the movie so fascinating in the first place.
And if there’s one element here that makes the Backrooms movie stand out from any previous lore/mythology, it has to be the genius addition of the Still Life entities. Warped recreations of real people that somehow wandered into the Complex, these misremembered creatures are responsible for some of the most disturbing imagery of 2026 – as well as laugh-out-loud memes created by one of the film’s very own concept artists.
However, true to Parsons’ word that the movie would rely heavily on practical effects, each of these distorted monsters was brought to life by real actors under heavy layers of makeup and prosthetics (with the occasional splash of CGI enhancements). While Anora and If I Had Legs I’d Kick You actress Ivy Wolk wasn’t among these performers, despite what Letterboxd might have you believe, the creature cast did benefit from veteran players with plenty of genre experience.
For starters, Alien: Romulus alumni Robert Bobroczkyi (who previously brought that film’s horrific Offspring to life during its most memorable sequence) plays the flick’s main antagonist, the Still Life version of Captain Clark. And though there was some obvious CGI involved in making the character’s peg-leg and nightmarish face more believable, Bobroczkyi’s monstrous performance and his natural 7’7″ frame helped to make that final chase sequence a clear highlight among this year’s genre offerings.
The film’s Texas-Chain-Saw-inspired “dinner” scene also features a freaky collection of less-aggressive Still Life creatures in the form of the Bearded Man, the Red-Headed Woman and, strangest of them all, the cheekily named “Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life” (who earned this title among fans and crewmembers as a reference to his apparent affinity for lamps).
While this was the first major horror outing for both Patrick Baynham (The Bearded Man) and Dana Mahmood (Archibald), Rhiannon Roberts has worked as a stunt performer in everything from Yellowjackets to HBO’s The Last of Us adaptation – which is probably why The Red-Headed Woman is the most active out of Clark’s impromptu “family.” That being said, the Archibald Leland Sutter Still Life is my personal favorite of the bunch simply because his anachronistic outfit suggests that the Backrooms phenomenon might be a lot older than the Async Foundation. I also love how hard he tries to be helpful with that little light of his!
That might be it for the Still Life entities, but I think horror fans will also be pleased to hear that the film’s Found Footage prologue stars none other than Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City star Avan Jogia as Naren Warne – and American Mary herself Katharine Isabelle also shows up in a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it cameo at Mary’s house party towards the middle of the story (though I have a feeling that she originally had a bigger part that was likely cut for time).
At the end of the day, Parsons’ Backrooms may have been an auteur-driven project motivated by the young director’s unique take on the classic creepypasta, but film has always been a collective artform, so it’s fun to see just how many talented performers it takes to bring this kind of supernatural nightmare to life in a way that connects with so many people.
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