Review of 28 Days Later (2002) by Harry W — 06 Feb 2015

Serving as a critically acclaimed zombie film from director Danny Boyle, 28 Days Later sounded like a good genre to see him working with.

With the zombie genre being largely hijacked in the 1980's and 1990's to serve as a time for them to turn into horror comedies and distinctively 80's films with a sense of comedy within them, it is an interesting change of pace to see them follow a more George A. Romero style in the way that Danny Boyle takes the premise of the film very seriously and gives it a dark atmosphere instead of milking anything for laughs. Unfortunately, this is for better and for worse.

28 Days Later is not an exploitive zombie film but rather touches upon the horror of its concepts while also exploring the intense politics of a post-apocalyptic society without a civilization for people to live in safely. The issue seems to be that instead of grasping its horror ambitions, 28 Days Later gets caught up with its characters and dramatic concepts. I'll admit that the protagonist was likable enough to warrant a certain sense of sympathy which is greater than in the average zombie film, but the scary moments of the story were largely overshadowed by the slow pacing of the film and its focus on characters on politics rather than zombies.

For a low budget film, 28 Days Later is certainly a stylish feature. It maintains a small scale story but uses a universe that feels legitimate in its post-apocalyptic themes due to small elements of production design and scenery which feels bereft of human life. The visual style of 28 Days Later is intruging. It took me a while to figure out the fact that the rough audio quality of the film was intentional, and those who don't understand that may find it to be of the quality of a poor pirated DVD. I'll admit that it occasionally made things a bit blurry especially in the scenes with less than sufficient lighting which in itself was largely a problem throughout a lot of the film, but overall it was somewhat intriguing. What is more impressive is the cinematography in the film because the way that 28 Days Later is shot seems rather experimental at times and more conventional at others. But most importantly, it always remains appropriately atmospheric. The emptiness of the universe feels clear, and the zombies of the film feel genuinely threatening which allows the tension to gradually seep its way in. It goes between gradually building up its horror and jumping out at scenes which means that it moderates things well, so 28 Days Later serves as another example of Danny Boyle being strongly able to handle tense atmosphere in a new genre. His directorial work is strong and stylish where he is able to make maximum use out of a meagre $8 million budget. He manages to bring a lot of visual and atmospheric flair to a story which fails to appeal to me as a fan of both traditional zombie movies. 28 Days Later may be appropriately tense in its atmosphere, but the slow pace of the film really overshadowed that while the premise tried really hard to be smart and succeeded occasionally at the expense of being consistently entertaining as a horror film.

To be frank, 28 Days Later is rather simple as a horror film. It is intelligent in terms of its political context, but that is not the reason I would find myself watching zombie films. It wasn't the case with the original Night of the Living Dead, it wasn't the case with the remake of Dawn of the Dead and it is not the case with 28 Days Later. Even then, if the film really intended to grasp some insightful political themes then it would have to make the scale of the focus in the story significantly larger than the way it follows the few main characters of the film and their few experiences with zombies. There wasn't enough horror for me, nor were there enough scares even though Danny Boyle proved that with his directorial talent he is more than capable of establishing that type of thrill. If he was handed a better story I feel that 28 Days Later could have been an impressive zombie film because Danny Boyle proves that he has a George A. Romero-esq flair for handling the genre, and his work on the film leaves me eager to see the sequel even though he does not serve as the director to the next entry in the series.

And the cast of the film are effective enough with a couple of standouts.

Cillian Murphy makes an effective lead in 28 Days Later. While he plays the character Jim without any iconic elements to the role, he easily fits the profile of a likable everyman. His role is not an emotionally complex one, but while he responds to the horror of the post-apocalyptic future effectively and has an intense stare in his eyes, more of the time he fits the role because he emphasizes the grim melancholy of being stuck in a horrific and lifeless future which is likely to strip away one's will to live beyond simple survival instincts. Cillian Murphy's simple leading performance in 28 Days Later is a fairly strong one.

Brendan Gleeson is a welcome presence. As he serves as the father figure of the main characters, he maintains a certain sense of wisdom to him which he uses to charm the viewers. And while his screen time is small, he manages to interact with the rest of the cast and the universe around him very easily as well as giving a powerful dramatic send-off in his final scene in the film. He stands out as the most likable member of the cast.

So 28 Days Later boasts strongly atmospheric and stylish directorial work from Danny Boyle, but the film gets too caught up in the characters and politics of the story to put sufficient focus on the nature of its zombie horror.