Oh, nostalgia.
Alice in the first movie was likable, nice, and really cool. Alice in this movie is bah. Too much posing and not enough content. The directing was pretty shoddy, the action scenes over the top, and while I can deal with over the top action sequences (LOVE THEM!) the obvious crap cherography made me want to grind my teeth. Though Jovovich is still hot. Jill Valentine came across as a hard nosed slut (not impressed), but at least they got the outfit right! (the BOOTS!) but her hair was absolutely dreadful. Jill had nice, soft, smooth hair, not hair with enough gel in it that it doesn't move. And when did Jill ever smoke? Carlos was ok.
The first film was much better because it didn't try to be anything it was not. It was a survival horror movie, deal. The action scenes were short and didn't go for over the top sequences that the director couldn't handle. Thus, fight scenes were effective. Special effects wasn't over done, thus, making it that more impressive when they did use it. It was fun and it was true to the game, which made it that much more fun. The second felt like they were making things up as they went along, and while it was pretty (posing by the actors in supposedly cool stunts that did nothing to the plot, and in fact made it less 'real') and they got the set perfect, the bad directing just screws up the whole thing. I went from loving Alice's character to wanting to shoot her myself, and that's never a good sign.
Just proves that bigger budget doesn't mean a good film.