We’re not so far after the events of the first film where the rage virus is still fresh and spreading like wildfire. While we just have to hope for the best for Jim and his girlfriend, we’re introduced to some new characters, which starts at a barricaded, cozy cottage in the countryside of England. Yes, we’re still in England, and I don’t mind. Their tea is something else. Anyway, Don (Robert Carlyle), his wife Alice (Catherine McCormack) and some other survivors are getting ready for dinner. Then someone knocks on the door, a boy who’s been chased by his freshly-infected family. And he’s frightened. Of course he is. As Alice lets him in, we see a glimpse of how heavily barricaded the house is as the sun shines through like laser beams.
Then, suddenly, all hell explodes as one of the infected that chased the boy manages to punch through the walls, which weren’t so heavily barricaded after all, bites Alice and we have one of the most intense opening sequences in a zombie film since the singaia scene in Braindead. It’s full non-stop chaos where even the cameraman really struggles not to get attacked. It all escalates to Don sliding out of the top-floor window and leaving his wife behind, and his last memory of her will be her screaming for help from a window while being trapped. I couldn’t have lived with myself after a situation like that, but that’s maybe just me. Because the big question here is why she hasn’t already been turned into a red-eyed zombie, since we’ve already learned that the virus only takes seconds to strike. Huh. Yeah, you can say.
If Don couldn’t, or wouldn’t, save his wife, because he’s maybe a cowardly narcissist, he meets the next level of Mission Impossible – to run away from a horde of infected Tom Cruises to the river so he can escape on a boat. Don(e).
And just to have a quick summary, we get a text timeline of the events:
15 days later: Mainland Britain is quarantined
28 days later: Mainland Britain has been destroyed by the rage virus
5 weeks later: The infected have died of starvation
11 weeks later: An American-led Nato force enters London
18 weeks later: Mainland Britain is declared free of infection
24 weeks later: Reconstructions begins
Then we are 28 weeks later. And god knows how many timeline texts we’ll get in 28 Years Later!
So, what we’ve learned now, there’s no more threat from the rage virus. The society starts to come together, families reunite, postman Pat can finally deliver mail in Greendale again, and maybe we can celebrate the next Christmas. Empathy is back… for now. London is split into the secure zone District One, heavily guarded with the help of the US military. Since the first film was such a huge success in the states, the producer probably thought that mixing the film with American actors would please them even more. It didn’t seem to work as the film earned 20 million less than the first one. But it made a big profit nevertheless. Here we have a relatively unknown Jeremy Renner, way before his Marvel days, as Doyle the sniper. Harold Perrineau, always most known for sitting in a wheelchair and speaking in metaphors in the TV show Oz, as a chopper pilot. Rose Byrne is Scarlett, the medical chief who tests and approves people to enter the secure zone. You know, just in case someone should just be too unlucky to have some of the virus in their bloodstream, as it can be spread by dogs and rats. And there’s no vaccine yet.
Don, the one who we saw in the opening scene, reunites with his two kids, Andy (Mackintosh Muggleton) and Tammy (Imogen Poots) as they arrive at District One. They were out of the country when the outbreak happened. But where’s mum? Yeah, where the fuck is Alice, Don? Don does what a narcissist does by lying and saying that he tried to save her while he fakes some crocodile tears. Tammy and Andy sneak out of the safe zone to go for some open world exploring with a scooter in the big, empty and desolated London. Because why the hell not. Yeah, there are some really questionable and logical issues here, but whatever. They stop by their former home, where they, to their big surprise, stumble into their mum, Alice! She’s a bit shaky and disorientated, but very alive and not infected, despite that she got bitten. She gets taken back to the safe zone to get examined by Scarlett, who believes that Alice’s immunity could be a source of a vaccine. And Don has some explaining to do. At the same time, he seems genuinely happy to see that Alice is alive. So it’s not always too easy to read that man. He enters her medical room, when no one is holding guard. Don and Alice have a reunion where “The Kiss of Death“ couldn’t be more literal.
Yes – Don, the airhead that he is, kisses her fully contagious wife straight on the mouth with the tongue and all. Yuck. He turns immediately into a raving infected, gauges her eyes before he spreads chaos and panic in heartbeats. A bittersweet karma for Don. Just too bad that the rest of the world had to go down with him. It’s time to escape the big city – again! But now it’s Code Red, which means that all soldiers are ordered to shoot and kill everyone, and that also includes the uninfected. The difficulty level is now set on nightmare mode as we follow Andy and Tammy running and using their stealth skills through a minefield of snipers, while also avoiding the infected. One life, one hit-death, no continues.
So there’s the sprint start 28 Weeks Later, more or less. This time directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo while Danny Boyle and Alex Garland is put on the sideline as producers. While the first one focused more on the psychological aspects with a more bleak and somber tone, this one goes straight to the jugular, with more blood, more gore, more rage and more action. One of the highlights involves a messy zombie massacre by using the blades of a helicopter, a very similar gag we also saw in Planet Terror, which came out the same year. Not much new on the surface here, and not much more to learn than we already know. It’s overall a fine and entertaining sequel that at least manages to keep up with the same energy and adrenaline as the first one, rich on locations with some more nice set-pieces of a deserted London to spice up the apocalyptic surroundings.
There’s not much of a spoiler to say that there’s no happy ending here, as we have now finally reached the big milestone of 28 Years Later. This one ended with a cliffhanger, or a sort of, where the virus has been able to spread itself outside the UK to France, with a quick teaser that the next installment would take place in Paris. And that film never happened, nor did 28 Months Later. So in that case, it’s maybe about time to re-watch the French action/zombie flick La Horde (2009), which, as I remember, could as well work as a spinoff.
Director: Juan Carlos Fresnadillo
Writers: Rowan Joffe, Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, Enrique López Lavigne, Jesús Olmo
Country & year: UK/Spain/USA, 2007
Actors: Robert Carlyle, Rose Byrne, Jeremy Renner, Harold Perrineau, Catherine McCormack, Idris Elba, Imogen Poots, Mackintosh Muggleton, Amanda Walker
IMDb: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0463854/
