Trivia / Resident Evil: Apocalypse

• Actor-Inspired Element: It was Milla Jovovich's idea to say there was a heat wave in Raccoon City, to account for Alice and Jill not wearing very much. It was a brave decision, as they were filming the movie in Toronto in the middle of a very cold November.
• Actor-Shared Background: Thomas Kretschmann was born in East Germany just like his character Timothy Cain according to Keith R.A. DeCandido's novelization of the film.
• B-Team Sequel: Paul W.S. Anderson was going to direct the film, but his commitment to Alien vs. Predator impeded it. He remained as producer and writer, though.
• California Doubling: The film was shot in Toronto, with the final act taking place in and around that city's very distinctive city hall. It was the largest production to be shot there to date.
• Cast the Expert: Oded Fehr was in the Israeli military, so he already knew how to use a gun when playing Carlos.
• Creator Backlash: Jovovich was disappointed with the final product, revealing Executive Meddling had forced them to discard pieces of story and character development in favor of action scenes. Anderson was similarly discontent with the work of his substitute Alexander Witt, who was actually making his directorial debut.
• Creator Killer: Witt would not direct another film in 14 years.
• The Danza: Technically. Stuntman Matthew G. Taylor plays Nemesis, who's actually Matthew Addison.
• Deleted Scene: The DVD contains 12 minutes of deleted footage, most notably an in-universe commercial for a "T-cells" anti-age cosmetic made by Umbrella (which was later used as a teaser trailer) and an alternate ending (in which Alice exits the medical facility without finding armed guards and gets reunited with Jill in her car).
• Dyeing for Your Art: Sienna Guillory is blond but dyed her hair black for the role.
• Edited for Syndication: In the TV-14 cut, LJ has a serious affinity for calling people "Motivators". Just guess what goes there in the uncut version.
• Fake American:
  • Sienna Guillory (Jill) and Razaaq Adoti (Peyton) are British.
  • Sandrine Holt (Terri) is Canadian.
• Fake Brit: Sophie Vavasseur (Angie) is Irish.
• Fake Nationality:
  • Zack Ward (Nicholai) and Stefen Hayes (Yuri) are Canadians playing Russians.
  • Carlos Olivera's nationality isn't known in the games, but it leans towards Brazilian, as his name is written as Oliveira there. Meanwhile, Oded Fehr is Israeli (but speaks his lines with an American accent). The novelizations address it by stating Olivera is a Brazilian of Israeli ascendancy.
• No Stunt Double: Jovovich did by herself part of Alice's rundown through the city hall, replacing her stunt double when she was at about 200 feet above ground. She also did stunts for the first chase scene with Nemesis, in which she almost ended up injured when she got accidentally tangled in some wires.
• The Other Darrin:
  • The Red Queen was recast because the original child actress had gotten too old to reprise her role.
  • Sort of with Nemesis. He is actually a mutated Matt but played by stuntman Matthew G. Taylor rather than Eric Mabius. The latter was originally set to return, showing Matt transforming into Nemesis, but he had to pull out.
• Star-Making Role: For Sienna Guillory. Although she had already worked in a couple big scale films, it was her role as Jill what put her on the Hollywood map.
• Troubled Production: Not as much as most examples of this, but making the film was not an easy road. Filming in Toronto in November meant they had to shoot with very cold weather, which affected particularly Jovovich and Guillory, as they had to wear little clothing due to their characters. There was even a SARS outbreak that almost halted production. Also, Matthew G. Taylor's Nemesis suit weighed 60 pounds (not counting his machinegun, which weighed even more) and was so tiresome and hot that he could not shoot more than 15 minutes between breaks.
• What Could Have Been:
  • Eric Mabius was enthusiastic about returning to play Nemesis, even studying the character in depth to adopt its body language, but he pulled out before production for unknown reasons.
  • Paul W.S. Anderson wanted Natasha Henstridge or Mira Sorvino to play Jill, but both of them were unavailable.
  • The character of L.J was originally written for Snoop Dogg, but he had to pull out, so it was changed to fit Mike Epps. In addition, L.J was supposed to be a pimp going by the name of Daddy Prime who was hiding from the zombies in a building and had far lesser role before he became a major character.
  • Jason Isaacs, who had made a cameo in the first film as a character that might have been Dr. William Birkin, was set to return, but he had to drop out for undisclosed reasons. He was replaced in the script by Iain Glen playing the Canon Foreigner Dr. Isaacs, whose surname was a direct homage to Jason.
  • Claire Redfield was set to appear in the film, but she was deleted from the script after not one, but two casting choices (Gina Phillips and Emily Bergl) failed to make it to the project. She would finally appear in Resident Evil: Extinction, played by Ali Larter.
  • Jill was meant to meet up with Alice sooner in the film, but this was changed to a Two Lines, No Waiting format for better pacing.
  • In the original plans, Timothy Cain would have survived the Raccoon City incident only to be assassinated later by Alice in a sort of epilogue. Anderson decided to have him killed by zombies in the city for the sake of brevity (and poetic justice).
  • The movie was originally going to be titled Resident Evil: Nemesis but was changed after Star Trek: Nemesis came out earlier that year.
• Word of God: Alice is not the character's real name, but a fake identity she adopted. Promotional materials give her last name as Abernathy, which is presumably her fake surname. This is also why she's called "Project Alice" in this film and the sequels.