‘Maintain the quarantine’
28 Weeks Later is a 2007 British-Spanish post-apocalyptic science fiction horror film, structured as a sequel to the 2002 critical and commercial success, 28 Days Later. The film was co-written and directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, with Danny Boyle and Alex Garland, respectively director and writer of 28 Days Later, now acting as executive producers.
Plot teaser:
During the original outbreak of the Rage Virus, Don, his wife Alice, and four other survivors are hiding in a barricaded cottage on the outskirts of London. They hear a terrified boy pounding at their door, and they let him in. A few minutes later, they find that the Infected have followed the boy to them. The Infected attack and kill most of the survivors, while Don, Alice, and the boy are chased upstairs. Don is separated from Alice and the boy by the Infected and jumps out of a window, abandoning them. Don desperately sprints to a nearby motorboat and narrowly escapes.
After five weeks, all the Infected have died of starvation. After eleven weeks, NATO forces headed by the United States take control of Great Britain. After eighteen weeks, the island is declared relatively safe, although still under quarantine.
Twenty-eight weeks after the outbreak, an American-led force, under the command of Brigadier General Stone, bring in settlers to re-populate the area. Among the new arrivals are Tammy and Andy, Don and Alice’s children, who were in Spain on a school trip during the initial outbreak. They are subsequently admitted to District One, a safe zone guarded by the U.S. Army, on the Isle of Dogs. As they are examined by Major Scarlet Levy, the District’s Chief Medical Officer, she notes Andy’s differently coloured eyes, a trait inherited from his mother. Sergeant Doyle, a Delta sniper and his friend, Chief Flynn, a helicopter pilot, are amongst the military presence charged with guarding the District. Tammy and Andy are reunited with their father, who, having survived the original infection, was found by the U.S. Army and has become the District’s caretaker. In their new flat, Don explains what happened to him and their mother and that after escaping, he arrived at a military camp and survived by waiting for the Infected to die of starvation…
Reviews:
“28 Weeks Later is not for the faint of heart or the weak of stomach. It is brutal and almost exhaustingly terrifying, as any respectable zombie movie should be. It is also bracingly smart, both in its ideas and in its techniques. The last shot brought a burst of laughter at the screening I attended, a reaction that seemed to me both an acknowledgment of Mr. Fresnadillo’s wit and a defense against his merciless rigor.” A.O. Scott, The New York Times
“The set-pieces, however, escalate with mostly excellent results: watching it all go wrong for the military — and their desperate response — is harrowing, but the tonal shift in a scene involving a helicopter and the infected on a heath which strays into Peter Jackson/Sam Raimi comic-horror territory is less effective. Momentum is regained, though, for a strong, dark finish.” Kim Newman, Empire
“Although the general tone might be considered anti-American, the principal sympathetic figures, apart from the fugitive children, are all in the American army – the woman doctor, a black helicopter pilot and a disgusted sniper who turns to helping his designated victims. But the movie is ruthless and not only in the way it spares no one from plague and bullet. The chilling theme is that the road to hell on earth is paved with good intentions, starting with the well-meaning scientists and the animal activists who light the fuse, and continuing with those inspired by compassion and moral decency.” Philip French, The Observer
Cast:
- Robert Carlyle as Don
- Rose Byrne as Scarlet
- Jeremy Renner as Doyle
- Harold Perrineau as Flynn
- Catherine McCormack as Alice
- Mackintosh Muggleton as Andy
- Imogen Poots as Tammy
- Idris Elba as Stone
