28 Days Later
People acting like rage-filled monsters in Britain? Must be Wednesday.
Reminder for reviews: I'm only really going to talk about what stood out to me, so anything I don't bring up is most likely just fine.
If an issue isn't bad enough to detract from the experience, then that's a good thing - just like something not standing out as being noteworthy doesn't necessarily make it a bad thing.
It's perfectly fine for a thing to serve its purpose and nothing more.
MOVIES
- 28 Days Later plot summary: Four weeks after a mysterious, incurable virus spreads throughout the United Kingdom, a handful of survivors try to find sanctuary. (IMDb)
- It is still surprising to me that I haven't written about 28 Days Later before as it's a movie I'm incredibly familiar with thanks to having watched it a lot.
- Fast 'zombies' (aka 'rage'-infected people), influencing zombie-based media forever and it's set in the UK, with a big chunk in London? Yes please.
- It's not the prettiest movie though, being shot on SD digital camcorders, which makes some of the calls for a blu-ray or 4K release seem really weird to me.
- Despite the not-great quality of the visuals, they really do sell the post-apocalyptic tone of the story and there are still some stunning shots in there.
- The sound design is excellent too, with an incredible score ratcheting up the tension to maximum every time it's needed, which is pretty bloody often here.
- Then there's the cast, which is filled with big names and, along with Sunshine, makes me think there should be a 'Danny Boyle season' at the cinema treating some of these older movies as new releases.
- Seriously, Cillian Murphy alone would be enough to put bums on seats and also let people know he was an excellent actor long before Oppenheimer, Peaky Blinders or even The Dark Knight trilogy.
- Add in Brendan Gleeson as Frank, Naomie Harris as Selena and Christopher Eccleston as Major West and I'm pretty confident it'd do well as a re-release.
- If I have two criticisms of the film, it would be that the story does fall into the cliched 'man is the real monster' routine in the second half of the movie and the ending is... not quite right after what you've seen.
- As a result, the third is a little predictable, although still impeccably executed so that really isn't too much of a problem, per se.
- The ending though, is a bit weird although it does make a little sense when you know that a more downbeat ending was originally intended.
- Even then, it's not a bad ending, but just doesn't feel in keeping with the frenetic, tension-filled excellence that makes up the rest of the movie.
- Unfortunately, because it's the very last part of the movie, it might be enough to leave some viewers with a lesser opinion of the film than it truly deserves.
- 28 Days Later is a brilliant horror film that I would thoroughly recommend everyone watches it by any means possible and don't worry about the visuals: it's supposed to look like that. [9/10]
GAMES
- No games finished over the last week and very little progress made in those I'm playing.
- I've chipped away at Baldur's Gate 3's third act, but still have a looong way to go there.
- I've completed the suicide mission in Mass Effect 2, with only Jacob dying (intentionally on my part).
- I still have the Arrival DLC, as well as Tali and Zaeed's loyalty missions to go, so I get to have fun seeing the Quarians react to me bringing a geth with me and so I can leave Zaaed to die.
- That might sound cruel, but I have set plans for Mass Effect 3 and am just getting everything set as I like it.
TV
- The Bad Batch has been started and it's incredible how good that show looks, carrying on from the incredible-looking final season of Star Wars: The Clone Wars.
- Fortunately, it's a short show of just three seasons and then I'll be taking advantage of my cheapo Prime Video subscription for a bit after the third season rather than continuing on to Star Wars: Rebels.
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