The first thing you notice is the firm handshake.
Well, the firm handshake would be the first thing you notice if not for the eyes.
Those killer eyes are no doubt responsible for Milla Jovovich being where she is today, which is sitting in a luxury suite at a beachfront hotel in Santa Monica and discussing her starring role in the highly anticipated sci-fi/zombie sequel “Resident Evil: Apocalypse.”
The eyes also explain a long, successful modeling career that shows no sign of decline. In fact, at an advanced age for a model (28), Forbes magazine recently named her as the highest-paid model in the world. She is a longtime spokeswoman for L’Oreal and is the current cover subject for Maxim magazine, modeling a tiny bikini that she designed as part of her own line of clothing.
The Ukrainian-born actress/model/entrepreneur, who migrated to the U.S. with her family in 1980, began her acting career at 9 in a Disney TV movie, started modeling at 11 when noted photographer Herb Ritts shot her for a fashion spread in a European magazine and has left a string of 150 magazine covers and more than a dozen movie roles (“The Fifth Element,” “Zoolander” and “The Messenger: The Story of Joan of Arc,” to name just three) in her wake.
But it was her role as Alice, the zombie-fighting heroine of “Resident Evil” in 2002, that elevated her as an actress.
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Based on a series of video games, “Resident Evil” was the story of a high-tech scientific experiment gone awry. A virus wiped out almost all the inhabitants of a secret underground complex called The Hive. An even bigger problem was that they didn’t stay dead.
In the sequel, opening Friday, Alice awakens from a coma to discover that the virus has infected the rest of the city, and she must not only battle the zombies who walk among us, but the security forces of the evil corporation that invented the virus and now wants to maintain damage control. Oh, did we mention that the company turned Alice into the six-million-dollar woman while she was asleep?
Jovovich recently talked about the role and the video game that inspired it.
How tough were you when you were training [for this role]?
I was pretty yoked. I was all muscles, and it wasn’t very attractive.
What do you mean?
Let’s just say that, in normal times, I’m flat as a board. So when I started training, I turned into a boy. If I shaved my head, you wouldn’t be able to tell I was a girl. My arms were so big, I was embarrassed to wear a T-shirt without sleeves.
And yet you weren’t afraid to appear nude in this movie.
Well, I thought it was beautiful. It wasn’t a sex scene. The situation is that the girl is inside a tank of water. It would look cheesy if she was wearing underwear.
Do you remember your reaction when you read the script for “Resident Evil”?
I remember having the same feeling reading the script as I did when I played the game with my younger brother.
[So] you were familiar with the video game before you did the movie.Oh yeah. My brother was the one that pushed me to do the movie in the first place. He was 13 at the time. … He said that if I was the chick from “Resident Evil,” I was a god.
Is a sequel anything but a big payday for you?
I’m not going to lie to you. I got paid very well. More than a big payday, though, I kept thinking how cool it was that my mother could show her friends that I was in a double-CD box set. That is something to be proud of. Not every actress gets to have a franchise like “The Lord of the Rings” or “Alien.” There aren’t many girls out there who have sequels to action films.
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Edited by Cara DiPasquale ([email protected]) and Kris Karnopp ([email protected])