You probably don’t have to guess what a property like Resident Evil will be rated, especially with a filmmaker like Zach Cregger at the helm after his massively popular Weapons. However, the MPA has officially listed their new batch of film ratings via their latest bulletin. It’ll be no surprise that the movie has been granted an R-rating. And the MPA has listed that it earned that with strong bloody violence, gore and language throughout.
Previously, Cregger had described the upcoming video game adaptation as “definitely the most violent thing I’ve done,” promising fans a relentless, blood-soaked survival horror experience that embraces the franchise’s monster-filled roots. “You gotta go grotesque!” Cregger said. “I wanted to go all the way. So it’s gnarly. It’s brutal. A very bloody affair.”
Cregger wrote the screenplay with Shay Hatten (Army of the Dead) and the story apparently harkens back to the original Capcom game’s horror roots. Here’s the logline that leaked a while back: Bryan, a laid-back organ courier, is sent on a late-night delivery to Raccoon City General Hospital. En route through a snowy mountain road, he accidentally hits a strange woman with his car. She survives—but something is very wrong. As he tries to help, Bryan stumbles into a full-blown outbreak involving horrifying tentacle-based mutations and bio-engineered monstrosities.
And here’s the official synopsis: From the mind of visionary filmmaker Zach Cregger (Weapons, Barbarian) comes a thrilling — and terrifying — reinvention of the Resident Evil franchise. In an all-new story, Resident Evil follows Bryan (Austin Abrams), a medical courier who unwittingly finds himself in an action-packed, non-stop race for survival as one fateful, horrifying night collapses around him in chaos.
Weapons cast member Austin Abrams has the lead role and is joined in the cast by Paul Walter Hauser (Cobra Kai), Zach Cherry (Severance), Johnno Wilson (I Love That for You), and Kali Reis. Cherry is said to be playing a scientist at a hospital and Reis is set to play an ex-military character that was initially written for a male actor.
Resident Evil is set to hit theaters on September 18.