28 Weeks Later (2007) - 6/10

I’m rewatching the 28 later films. I’ve just enjoyed 28 Days Later, but not as much as expected. I have seen this sequel before, but recall nothing about it. Why might that be. We’re 6 months on from the viral apocalypse and Don (Robert Carlyle) is having a bad day. He was holed up in a nice, albeit dark and dank farm house with his wife, Alice (Catherine McCormack), until zombies tear through and he chooses to save only himself, leaving his wife as zombie fodder. The virus has killed pretty much the entire mainland population, the infected have since staved to death. The Americans (why is it always Americans) have brought the army in to start reconstruction. This is where we meet Doyle (Jeremy Renner) and Stone (Idris Elba), they’re army and Scarlet (Rose Byrne), a medic. This is also where Don is reunited with his kids, who’d been out of the country on a fortunate school trip. He tells them he tried to save their mum. So we’ve got a hero family, with a lying dad and a complacent army, largely convinced the danger is over as everyone makes a fresh start on the Isle of Dogs in London. Not much of a zombie film there. Maybe everything would be fine if that were it, but like I say then we wouldn’t have a film. The kids, Tammy (Imogen Poots) and Andy (Macintosh Muggleton) want to get some things from their old house, so break out, pinch a moped and give the DOP chance to grab some lovely eerie shots that made the first film pop. They of course find more at their house than they imagined… they find mum! She’s not showing symptoms, but is infected and before long Idris is using his best gruff voice to issue a code red and Doyle and the yeehaw military spring into action. We have zombies on the loose. Carlyle is usually good, but he’s not great in the opening act. As a zombie though, he’s bloody wonderful. There’s plenty of gore. Shakey cameras, a million cuts to make some scenes headache inducing, a lovely score and in Andy, a hope of a cure. His mum seemed immune, it’s though he carries the same antibodies. Needless to say it’s all a bit more convoluted, but it does find its feet with Doyle, Scarlet and the kids vs. ZombieDad in the midst of a military firestorm, with the army doing more damage than any infection. Bloody Americans. It’s certainly not short on action, it shifts along at a decent pace. The acting is okay. It looks cool and it’s thrifty on runtime. You could drive a bus through some of the plot holes and it’s very much style over substance, perhaps why I’d forgotten it. Expectation is a dangerous thing. I was hoping for more from the original that came up short. I lowered the bar for this and it easily met it. It’s not quite as good as its predecessor, but it is very entertaining and whets the whistle for the long awaited return with the 2025 instalment.

6/10