Tom Hopper felt like he was “walking through a game” when filming ‘Resident Evil: Welcome to Racoon City’.
Tom Hopper stars in Resident Evil: Welcome to Racoon City
The 36-year-old actor portrays Albert Wesker in director Johannes Roberts’ upcoming franchise reboot and he found it “satisfying” to shoot zombies in the face, and admitted it felt like he was really immersed in the console game the movie is based on.
He said: “There’s something quite satisfying about [shooting a zombie].
“There’s a real-looking zombie, with the best make-up in the world, walking towards you and you shoot him. He reacts.
“It’s quite surreal when you are shooting these things because you do feel like you are walking through a game, even more so because they made the sets feel so nostalgic.
“Having been a fan of the game, I was like, ‘This is gnarly.’ ”
Tom is excited that ‘Racoon City’ could be the first time of many that he plays Wesker.
He told SFX magazine: “I’d be very open to the conversation of what we could do with him.
“From the first movie we’ve done, the idea of playing this character and moving on from his origin I find really interesting with the different things we can do with him.
“I also want to keep the idea that he’s not an out-and-out villain.
“That’s what has interested me so much about the way Johannes has written this version of Wesker.”
Tom hopes he has been able to “humanise” the villain.
He said: “Wesker in the game is quite two-dimensional in terms of, ‘He’s the villain’. Everything is, ‘I’m going to screw you all over’ and the audience already knows it. You just know this guy is up to no good.
“Whereas, with the Wesker I’m playing, I wanted to humanise him and make sure his motives were driven by personal gain, but there is a soul there.
“There is a person who is a friend to these people. I wanted to ground him and make him feel like a real person. But, also, almost like you didn’t see it coming.”