Remember what I wrote below about being all giddy and excited about 28 Days Later? Yeah, so, that was before I actually watched the damn thing.
PostPosted:Fri May 16, 2003 2:34 am
<div style='font: 10pt Arial; text-align: left; '>Ah, the great wonders of the piracy-happy world we live in. Somehow, through illegal means best left undescribed, a friend of mine managed to acquire a copy of the film on DVD-ROM, well over a month before its official theatrical release here in the states (the film has already made the rounds in its native Great Britain, where it was originally shot). Frankly, I would have been just as happy if they had left it across the Atlantic. Some scattershot observations:
This movie is no Night of the Living Dead, or Dawn of the Dead. It does, however, contain a number of obvious homages tossed in here and there, including one very blatant one in an abandoned convenience store where the characters merrily skip through the aisles and pile mounds of produce into shopping carts. No one throws wads of cash into the air, as in Dawn, although one person happily leaves his credit card at the checkout line, signifying the meaninglessness of currency post-zombie holocaust.
The film's opening five minutes consist of the following two things: idiot enviro-terrorists releasing infected monkeys and meeting gloriously deserved ends, and far-too lingering shots of male nudity. Yes, friends, I am talking about PENIS. Far, far TOO MUCH PENIS. Not the sort of thing I look for in zombie films, you understand.
28 Days Later is a zombie film, make no mistake about it. It may be, however, the first zombie film in which the word "zombie" never comes up, despite having hordes of very undead-looking people running about and biting human victims; doing, in other words, what pretty much all zombies do. The catch is that these charming folks aren't really dead, but rather victims of a viral disease that induces constant murderous rage (the virus itself is even cheekily named RAGE--haw haw haw) and leads one to do very little except hiss, run about and attack people, and often vomit never-ending streams of gloppy red karo syrup. The zombies here are also move very quickly, thanks to jerky digital editing scheme employed by director Danny Boyle to make their movements seem more frenetic and crazy, like animatronic zombie robots. "Aieee! Flee! Flee in horror from the turbo-zombies!"
Excluding one scene very late in the film when a character's eyes are gouged out, 28 Days Later isn't very gory for a zombie film, leading me to wonder, sadly, if we've seen the last of the great Grand Guignol days of the old Romero movies, with their eviscerations and disembowelling and general awe-inspiring carnage. I sure hope not. God knows I'd trade any number of shots of HAIRY MALE COCK for just a quick cut to a zombie having his head exploded like a watermelon by a M-80 firecracker (Lee, don't you say a goddamned <I>word</I>...)
Character development is a virtual nil. No problem, really; character development has never been a watermark by which zombie films tend to be judged. But I did have a quibble with how the main character, a former bicycle courier, manages to turn into fucking John Rambo and take down a number of trained military soliders with his bare hands. A wee bit suspicious.
Finally, for those of you who have seen the (admittedly good) trailer--which shows a few scenes of police officers donned in riot gear battling masses of rioters--you may be under the impression that the film explicitly details the collapse of civilization, with shots of army units battling marauding zombies and the like. If so, then you'd be just like me, only to have your hopes dashed with the quick realization that the movie shows nothing of the sort. Those cleverly-constructed clips, in fact, are actually stock footage shown in first couple minutes of the movie--to the RAGE-infected monkeys, in a sort of reverse Clockwork Orange-esque treatment designed to fill the poor animals with, I dunno, rage, I guess. Nothing whatsoever to do with zombies.
All in all, I'm very disappointed by this film. I'll probably go see it again in theaters for the reason that my copy didn't look very good, but I don't expect my opinion to change on the general substance in the film.</div>
This movie is no Night of the Living Dead, or Dawn of the Dead. It does, however, contain a number of obvious homages tossed in here and there, including one very blatant one in an abandoned convenience store where the characters merrily skip through the aisles and pile mounds of produce into shopping carts. No one throws wads of cash into the air, as in Dawn, although one person happily leaves his credit card at the checkout line, signifying the meaninglessness of currency post-zombie holocaust.
The film's opening five minutes consist of the following two things: idiot enviro-terrorists releasing infected monkeys and meeting gloriously deserved ends, and far-too lingering shots of male nudity. Yes, friends, I am talking about PENIS. Far, far TOO MUCH PENIS. Not the sort of thing I look for in zombie films, you understand.
28 Days Later is a zombie film, make no mistake about it. It may be, however, the first zombie film in which the word "zombie" never comes up, despite having hordes of very undead-looking people running about and biting human victims; doing, in other words, what pretty much all zombies do. The catch is that these charming folks aren't really dead, but rather victims of a viral disease that induces constant murderous rage (the virus itself is even cheekily named RAGE--haw haw haw) and leads one to do very little except hiss, run about and attack people, and often vomit never-ending streams of gloppy red karo syrup. The zombies here are also move very quickly, thanks to jerky digital editing scheme employed by director Danny Boyle to make their movements seem more frenetic and crazy, like animatronic zombie robots. "Aieee! Flee! Flee in horror from the turbo-zombies!"
Excluding one scene very late in the film when a character's eyes are gouged out, 28 Days Later isn't very gory for a zombie film, leading me to wonder, sadly, if we've seen the last of the great Grand Guignol days of the old Romero movies, with their eviscerations and disembowelling and general awe-inspiring carnage. I sure hope not. God knows I'd trade any number of shots of HAIRY MALE COCK for just a quick cut to a zombie having his head exploded like a watermelon by a M-80 firecracker (Lee, don't you say a goddamned <I>word</I>...)
Character development is a virtual nil. No problem, really; character development has never been a watermark by which zombie films tend to be judged. But I did have a quibble with how the main character, a former bicycle courier, manages to turn into fucking John Rambo and take down a number of trained military soliders with his bare hands. A wee bit suspicious.
Finally, for those of you who have seen the (admittedly good) trailer--which shows a few scenes of police officers donned in riot gear battling masses of rioters--you may be under the impression that the film explicitly details the collapse of civilization, with shots of army units battling marauding zombies and the like. If so, then you'd be just like me, only to have your hopes dashed with the quick realization that the movie shows nothing of the sort. Those cleverly-constructed clips, in fact, are actually stock footage shown in first couple minutes of the movie--to the RAGE-infected monkeys, in a sort of reverse Clockwork Orange-esque treatment designed to fill the poor animals with, I dunno, rage, I guess. Nothing whatsoever to do with zombies.
All in all, I'm very disappointed by this film. I'll probably go see it again in theaters for the reason that my copy didn't look very good, but I don't expect my opinion to change on the general substance in the film.</div>