As the second production from Black Gate Entertainment, Evilution is mostly a passable variation on the zombie flick but does manage to get in some attack scenes that have quite a bit of bloodiness and there's a fairly good jump scare involving an old lady and her laundry. Generally, though, it's 'business as usual' in yet another low-budget genre flick but I do have to mention how much the title Evilution bugs me. I can't quite put a finger on exactly why, but I've never been keen on the blending together of two different words and, being a regular video store customer, I don't think I'd give this a second glance just judging from its moniker.

Evilution opens on a hyperactive note as an American military base in Iraq is overrun with acrobatic, infected zombie-like soldiers who rip apart anyone that gets in their way. One of the soldiers, Darren (Eric Peter-Kaiser) manages to escape just before the Government proceeds to bomb the Hell out of the site.

Back in America, Darren's now posing as a high school science teacher and has just rented the basement in a dilapidated former hotel where most of its residents are wannabe gangsta types and the soon-to-be love interest Maddie (Sandra Ramirez). It looks like Darren smuggled some of the virus out of the base and has decided to continue his experiments trying to reverse the deadly effects of the formula - which, it turns out, is an alien bacteria. Along the way Brian Patrick O'Toole's script puts the romance between Darren and Maddie on the fast track, which I had a hard time buying into. Darren also befriends thuggish "Random" (Noel G.) and ends-up having to use the healing powers of the virus on him after he gets shot in a gang shooting.

If you've seen at least one horror movie in the past, you know that his decision is going to be a huge mistake and, sure enough, pretty soon Darren and all the residents of his building are being attacked, and becoming infected themselves, as the script channels 28 Days Later for a final third where our characters are trapped in the locked-down building trying to survive. They also introduce tough-guy Army Sergeant Gabriel (Tim Colceri) who has been sent in to retrieve our scientist and the vial to add more muscle for the "meh" finale that involves plentiful gunfire, the infected leaping from dark areas, and condoms filled with a combination of ammonia and chlorine being used as weapons.

Even though Evilution marks a minor leap in quality over Black Gate's inaugural feature, Cemetery Gates, it's the type of flick you pretty much forget about once it's over. There's no doubt that this is a cheaply made and quickly shot production since they've contained much of the action to the minimal amount of sets possible and I felt that, despite the presence of Guillermo Diaz (Half-Baked) as comic relief, things tend to be played more seriously than they should be - if you need evidence of this just remember what they've called this and take a gander at that over-the-top box art again. Still, I do admit to thinking the special effects weren't too bad and that debuting director Chris Conlee (who's an editor by trade) does keep things going at a fairly brisk pace, it's just too bad everything else is so ho-hum.

Probably the best example of "ho-hum" comes from the cast, which is filled with actors who've made careers of playing basically the same, minor character types. Take Colceri and Noel G. who have appeared in quite a few productions but usually as either Military types or gang bangers - so I guess they're playing to their strengths here (not really). In the lead role, Peter-Kaiser gets a shrug from me for doing nothing with his role while Ramirez did keep my attention thanks to being pleasant to look at and wearing low cut shirts at times. Hell, even Diaz looks like he wants to be somewhere else most of the time. (Chris Hartley, 2/21/10)

Directed By: Chris Conlee.
Written By: Brian Patrick O'Toole.

Starring: Eric Peter-Kaiser, Tim Colceri, Sandra Ramirez, Noel G.