MOSCOW, September 6 (Itar-Tass) —— Milla Jovovich, an American actress of Russian origin, has come to Moscow, bringing the fantasy film Resident Evil: Retribution. She will attend the film’s premiere in the Oktyabr cinema house on Thursday evening. The actress gave a press conference before the event.
She appeared before the media wearing a turquoise-colored jacket, a white blouse and dappled pants. She spoke Russian to thank reporters for attention and remarked that she understood Russian spoken but made mistakes speaking it. Nevertheless, she answered many questions at the press conference in fluent Russian, her mother tongue.
The film Resident Evil: Retribution will be released in the 3D format nationwide in Russia on September 13, and will be released in the US on September 14. In the film Alice played by Milla Jovovich fights a legion of zombies created by the evil Umbrella Corporation. Penetrating the corporation’s science base, Alice learns something about her own mysterious past.
Part of the shooting was made in Toronto and in Moscow. According to the plot, part of the Russian capital was to have been destroyed. Film director Paul Anderson, Milla Jovovich’s husband, said that Red Square had been closed so the shooting team could work. Scenes in the metro were filmed in the Arbatskaya station at night, he said.
The film director confessed he had dreamt of shooting in Moscow a scene of pursuit in Rolls Royce cars, but this was certainly impossible in the metro. He said three cars had been smashed, much to chagrin of Milla’s mother, Galina, who wished to take at least one of the cars after the shooting. Special effects were used in constructing the scene of Moscow being submerged. It is a very impressive sight when a wave sweeps the Kremlin and St Basil’s Cathedral, the film director said.
Milla, formerly a supermodel, was asked how many clothes she had taken along with her to Moscow. She said that travelling with her family she brought five suitcases. Regarding her style, Milla described it as being somewhat ironic. She said she did not take herself too seriously and wanted to be relaxed and feel comfortable. She said women like her wish their clothes to impress other women. It is easy to impress men: all it takes is to wear a deep d·colletage or a miniskirt. She said she wanted other women to appreciate her taste in clothes.
Jovovich said she had visited Moscow more than once, the latest time two years ago, for the shooting of the film starring Konstantin Khabensky that translates into Tricksters. She said she would like to come to Moscow with her husband and daughter and lead for a few months ordinary life, without staying in hotels, meet her mother’s friends, go to Russian shops, buy Russian delicacies.
“And, surely, vodka,” Paul Anderson added, smiling.
A question about classical Russian literature was put to the couple. Jovovich said she had always wanted to make a film about Anna Akhmatova whom she regarded as a very interesting person and whose poetry she liked very much. The actress also likes Mikhail Bulgakov’s novel The Master and Margarita but she believes the novel can be filmed only in Russian, as its adequate translation is hardly possible. “Don’t you want to make a film based on some Russian classical novel,” the actress asked her husband.
I am now busy making films about the destruction of the world, he answered, joking.
Milla Jovovich was born in Kiev on December 17, 1975 into the family of a Soviet actress Galina Loginova and a doctor from Yugoslavia Bogdan Jovovich. In 1980 the family emigrated to the United States. They lived then in reduced circumstances but by the time she was thirty Milla earned enough to buy a house in Los Angeles and apartments in New York and in Paris.
Jovovich started the modeling career at the age of eleven and had a debut in films at 13. Her first appearance in a feature film was in Two Moon Junction. Then she played in the films Return to the Blue Lagoon, Kuffs, Chaplin, The Messenger: The Story of Joan Arc, The Fifth Element, the Russian film that translates into Tricksters and stars Konstantin Khabensky, and in Resident Evil and its four sequels.