Spooky Season Reviews: 28 Years Later

  It has been almost 18 years since 28 Weeks Later, the sequel to the wildly successful, popular, and generally well-regarded 28 Days Later, the British post-apocalyptic franchise that updated the zombie movie motif while remaining true to fan-favorite tropes. This film, filmed back-to-back with another sequel, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, takes viewers back to Britain, where, surprise, things aren’t much better. Turns out that while most of the world managed to beat back the Rage virus, Great Britain continues to be under quarantine. Like its predecessors, this film is innovative, gory, and keeps viewers on the edge with its Infected that can run, pretty much all of whom are completely naked in this film, for some reason.

            This film begins with young Spike (Alfie Williams), and his father Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), residents of an island off the mainland protected by natural flooding, as they embark on a coming-of-age ritual for young Spike, as his father takes him to the mainland to get his first kill. They return to the island, upon which we meet Spike’s mother Isla (Jodie Comer), who is bedridden with a mysterious illness, and learn that Jamie is having an affair with a younger local girl while his wife convalesces at home. Enraged, young Spike decides to sneak his mother away from the island and go back to the mainland in search of the mysterious Doctor Kelson in search of a cure.

            What follows is a sort of journey story, sprinkled with precarious, violent encounters with the naked Infected of the island. When they find Dr. Kelson, he is revealed to live among a monument of human bones he has created. Also covered in iodine, which apparently staves off the Rage virus, Dr. Kelson is one part kind and brilliant, two parts a little bit crazy living on the mainland by himself.

            Like the previous films of the franchise, 28 Years Later is full of some brutal, bloody deaths, and a couple of moments that are a bit questionable and more than a little cringeworthy. I am an avid horror guy, but there’s some things that make even this seasoned horror fiend want to avert my eyes. Not quite-spoiler alert, if you get squeamish during shocking horror scenes, pro tip: when they encounter the pregnant lady, just … cover your eyes.

            The pivot from Spike and his dad on a journey to Spike and his mom on one came a little bit out of left field, and the characters, particularly the parents, could have used a little more development. Dr. Kelson, played by Ralph Fiennes, is by far the most dynamic character in the movie, and I’m glad to see that he’ll be returning for the next one. On that, speaking of the next one, the end of the film, again, not quite spoilery, and the Ninja Turtle antics of the bleached blonde pimpish cult people is an odd ending. I know it ties into the next one, as well as the prologue of this film, but the camera and stunt work were pretty odd after a movie that generally takes itself pretty seriously.

            Brutal and gory, if you don’t mind full frontal, blood-soaked Infected nudity, a couple of pretty awful moments, and a cliffhanger ending leading into the next film, 28 Years Later will be a good addition to your Spooky Season viewing.