28 DAYS LATER Rating: (out of 5 stars) Director: Danny Boyle Producer: Andrew Macdonald Writer: Alex Garland Director of Photography: Anthony Dod Mantle DFF Cast: Cillian Murphy, Naomie Harris, Christopher Eccleston, Megan Burns, Brendan Gleeson Visit the IMDB page for full cast and crew

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More 2003 LA Film Festival reviews.

Review by: Warren Curry
6/16/03

28 Days Later marks a return to form for director Danny Boyle, albeit a slight one. After making one of the greatest films of the 1990s (in my humble opinion), Trainspotting, Boyle then went on to direct the utter disaster, A Life Less Ordinary (one of the worst films of the past decade), and the faceless Leonardo Dicaprio vehicle, The Beach. One can reasonably deduce that the director had nowhere to go but up, and in 28 Days Later Boyle drives a lean script from Alex Garland (the author of the novel The Beach) with a strong sense of dynamics. In the tradition of good horror films, Boyle's movie, about an apocalyptic world where lethal zombies hunt the few remaining humans, nicely balances quiet builds with cathartic climaxes.

The opening scene, where a group of animal rights activists break into a primate research lab, is a doozie. Ignoring the impassioned protests of an on-duty scientist, the intruders liberate a group of "infected" chimps only to subsequently be the victims of the crazed animals, which unleashes a deadly virus upon the streets of England. A title card then reads: 28 days later…At this time we meet a bicycle courier named Jim (Cillian Murphy), who wakes up in a deserted hospital bed completely unaware of the state of the world outside. When a curious and confused Jim leaves the hospital, he first comes across piles of dead bodies in a church, and next must escape from a hotly pursuing group of "infected" humans. Jolly old England isn't exactly the way he remembers it.

Jim finds life-saving assistance in two other human survivors, the tough-as-nails Selena (Naomie Harris) and the equally resilient, Mark (Noah Huntley). In short order, they catch Jim up on the events of the previous 28 days. Any human, he learns, that comes in contact with the blood of the infected will turn into one of these rabid killers in a matter of moments. The human population of Great Britain has been all but wiped out by the infection.

After meeting up with a man named Frank (Brendan Gleeson) and his daughter Hannah (Megan Burns), the group hears via a radio transmission that there is a troop of soldiers in the northern part of the country who offer protection for any other survivors. Faced with no other choice, the small crew ventures north, escaping hordes of the infected along the way. Little do they know that their fellow humans may actually pose to them the greatest danger.

Obviously this film was written and shot prior to the outbreak of the SARS virus, and it would be a huge stretch to say this film has social commentary on its agenda, but there is something haphazardly timely about the paranoia of 28 Days Later. It is a genuinely frightening world that the unsuspecting Jim is thrust into, and Boyle is at his best when he taps into the raw energy of his material. He'll never be confused for a cerebral filmmaker, but the director is clever enough to exercise some restraint while racing his stories forward. Boyle and editor Chris Gill superbly piece together the bombastic early scenes, maximizing the impact of the film's manic thrills.

The DV format suitably serves the depiction of the apocalyptic world, as the film's color palette is consistently neutral and lifeless. The film's not very gory by today's horror standards, and the scares are a little more pedestrian than anticipated. The eerie atmosphere helps keep you on your toes, but the climactic scene, which relies on a dim lighting scheme and lots of chaos to communicate its creepiness, is a bit of a let down -- and even sort of comical to a horror cynic like me. The performances are decent enough with no real standouts, but no weak links either.

Overall, 28 Days Later is passable entertainment. It's not any sort of sign that Danny Boyle will ever return to his former greatness, but it is the first project in years that suits his strengths.

(Screened at the 2003 Los Angeles Film Festival)

(A Fox Searchlight release. Opens in wide release on June 27, 2003.)

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