28 Years Later
Review: The newest film in the ‘28 Days Later’ franchise this film is the follow up to ‘28 Days Later’ (2002) & ‘28 Weeks Later’ (2007), and in my opinion it blows both of them out of the water in every aspect. The film started in the scariest way possible, with Teletubbies. No but the ‘cold open’ really was very good and we quickly learn about the current state of the world making it easy to dive into the story. Well I guess I should say the state of England, not the world, because the funniest parts of these films is that the entire rest of the world is unaffected, isolating England. That is such a funny choice that we actually got to experience a little bit in this film. They quickly re-establish the preexisting lore, while also teaching us some new aspects. The film focuses on primarily on Spike, a 12-year old played by Alfie Williams, who made his film debut. I didn’t realize that Spike was going to be so solely in the spotlight, but it was a great choice, with a very good performance from Williams, making this post-apocalyptic horror film also double as a coming-of-age story. The film stars Aaron Taylor-Johnson & Jodie Comer as Spike’s parents, Jamie & Isla, both giving very solid performances as well. Even though he was unlikable at time I felt very secure & safe when ATJ was on screen, which is funny since he’s mostly absent in the entire second half of the film. The three of them live in an isolated island community right off of mainland England in which they will travel to the mainland to hunt. The community uses bow and arrows as their primary weapon, and bow and arrows are some of the coolest weaponry you can use in a film (just think about Legolas, Merida, or Robin Hood). Along the way we also meet a Swedish NATO soldier played by Edvin Ryding, whose side performance I really enjoyed. The standout performance though had to come from Ralph Fiennes. He plays a doctor that is sought out by Spike that has been living in isolation for several decades. Fiennes is one of the best working actors and he put his all into this film. His character, Dr. Kelson, is immediately a respected figure due to Fiennes’ gravitas & warmth. I will say that I think it’s hilarious that he hasn’t talked to anyone in so long and his bedside manner is still so good. I also want to say that this film made me tear up & I’ve thought about the film as a whole a lot since seeing it. The physical performances from the actors who play the infected was top tier & they were so much scarier in this film, making this one far and away the scariest of the three. Special shoutout to Chi Lewis-Parry who played the Alpha infected dubbed ‘Samson.’ The camerawork was also so different from anything I’ve seen and worked brilliantly, and if you haven’t you should look up pictures of the iPhone rig they used to film this movie. The ending was wacky, but worked & was pretty cool. And I think that’s everything I have to say about that.
High: This movie was so stylistic. What do I mean by that? The filmmakers (I’d assume specifically Boyle & Garland) made some very bold decisions and what made every decision work was that they fully committed to each. They decided to film it in an unconventional way. They decided to stick to the lore they established in the original film while also establishing some new rules. They decided to completely tonally shift the film in the final scene and give 100% to that new style.
Low: I mean the movie was super open ended and left us on a cliff hanger, which normally bothers me because there is currently always so much of a time gap between franchise films. But that’s not even the case here because the sequel comes in out in only 7(!) months, with a current release date of January 16, 2026. So shoutout to the team behind the films because that’s an awesome turn around. Another low is that I was hoping for a lot more of Jack O’Connell, but I know he was mostly there to set up a sequel.
Rating: 9.5/10
