28 Weeks Later (2007) Reviews

• I can't be scared because I can't get past how preposterous it was.

  rowman22222007-05-17

  I really enjoyed the first film. The characters were real, they made understandable decisions in stressful situations. It was a fresh take on a very cliché genera; zombie films. The second film, unfortunately, has none of that. Unrealistic characters making the same irrational, unintelligent choices that people in terrible slasher films make. Maybe taken on its own it would not have been that bad, but it has a much stronger film to live up to so it amplifies all of the weaknesses. I am sorry if I am giving some things away so stop reading now if you have not seen the film and want to "try" and be surprised. I say try because there was nothing, absolutely nothing, unpredictable about this film. The thing I found most absurd was that after only four months of failing to find an infected person, they already want to try to repopulate the island. Preposterous!!!! The greatest plague in the history of world and they are going back all cavalier? No. It would take years, maybe even decades before any re-population attempt would be made, and even then it would be a military only operation composed of troops and scientists. There would have to be global wide panels of experts and diplomats involved as the entire world would stand to be infected if something went wrong. Anthrax can live in moist soil for years so why not the rage virus? Maybe if the title was 28 months later, or more realistic, 28 years later. And then again, who would want to come back? There would have to be fantastic incentives to get people to move back. Such as no taxes for life, free property, hereditary titles, etc. But the filmmakers make no effort to explain why the people who moved back were motivated to do so. Then there is Robert Carlisle's character who is ultimately the person responsible for the re-emergence of the virus. He accomplished this because he has a magnetic pass key that gives him unfettered access to the entire complex, even top secret areas. He walks into a quarantine room of an individual, who turns out to be his wife, that is a carrier of the rage virus but is asymptomatic. He supposedly is some sort of civilian contractor or maintenance worker in the facility, but that wouldn't give him unrestricted access, he isn't even military. Come on!!! Then when the virus finally breaks back out (Too far into the movie to allow for much action in a 90 minute flick) the emergency protocols are so amateurish to be laughable. It is obvious right away that they have never given any or the re-patriots emergency drills because as they are being shuffled into quarantine chambers, they are all confused as to what is happening. You have to go through emergency drills your first day on a cruise ship and they are telling us that after repopulating Brittan after the most deadly plague of mankind, they are not even going to do some drills???? So when this inevitably fails (the zombies break into the quarantine zones, of course) in the ensuing panic, the soldiers cannot tell who is infected and who isn't. After not too much time, the general gives the order to shoot everyone just to be sure. Again, I was sitting in my seat fuming, all they would have had to broadcast on the PA was "Put up your right hand if you are not infected." Presumably zombies don't follow directions. But no, the soldiers start shooting everyone. I wonder if a Nuremburg defense would work in this instance? And of all the other soldiers shooting civilians, only one has moral qualms. Pathetic. From here, the movie devolves into the typical horror film. The surviving characters of the initial carnage band together and are slowly picked off by circumstance and the results of terrible decision making (Should I go into the Tube where it is dark and has no lights, or should I stay above ground where I can see where I am going?) Oh, and while in the tube, they navigate with a lone night vision scope on an assault rifle that the character doesn't point at the way ahead, but instead at the surviving characters heads, did she forget that the scope is attached to a gun? Who points a gun at peoples heads they are not intending to shoot. BTW this is the same character who earlier in the film corrected the word usage of a person and then made the same mistake herself. (What kind of writer didn't pick that up???) Oh, and Robert Carlisle just happens to appear in nearly every scene even though he is only supposed to be a zombie. It got really irritating to keep seeing him pop up all the time. Was someone directing his location????? Again, no explanation of why this particular zombie was so adept at finding the few survivors.

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• This is a dreadful film, and the reasons why are...

  capcanuk2007-05-14

  28 Weeks Later has to be the most disappointing sequel I've ever seen. This review will contain spoilers, however, it's nothing that the filmmakers themselves haven't spoiled to start with. Let's start with the most fundamental element of film-making: camera work. 28 Weeks Later is one of those pretentious films with the epileptic, hand-held camera that seems so popular with filmmakers who have nothing to actually say or show in their films. There are precious few scenes where the camera isn't both hand-held and in constant frenetic motion. It brings nothing to the film, creates no tension, and brings nothing new to the art of film-making. There are lengthy scenes that compound the camera work problem by also being filmed in simulated night vision. For those of you with a propensity to headaches or vision problems, this alone makes 28 Weeks Later a film to avoid. On to the story. This is, sadly, one of those films where stupid people do stupid things as the only means the filmmakers could think of to advance a pointless story. **spoilers start** These two kids have just arrived in the "secure zone" and yet are able to sneak out, past heavily armed guards, pas various security measures, and run off into an area they have been repeatedly told is not safe. Armed guards surround the city. Soldiers are everywhere. Everyone has a machine-gun, a pistol, night vision goggles… and yet, the discovery of an infected person, brought into the "secure zone", and absolutely NO precautions are taken? There are no extra guards; there are no extra security measures. To make matters even more "logical", it seems that all the soldiers in the area where this infected person is being kept are all either idiots, unarmed, or conscientious objectors. There is not one useful weapon to be found when it would be most useful. A soldier with a helicopter wants to rescue his buddy, yet the only thing he can think to do is have them crawl throughout the city to a distant spot to pick them up? Are there absolutely NO areas closer? This is just a completely useless gimmick to have the heroes of the story trek across town. I could go on listing plot holes large enough to float the entire U.K through, but I trust my warning will be enough to ward off those who are on the fence about seeing this film or not. Somehow, the kids' father has survived all the way through these events, despite all logic. Like the lone zombie in Day of the Dead who has learned to use a gun and appears to have regained some of his sentience, here we have an infected who defies all logic, including the internal logic of 28 Days Later, to follow his children and pop up at convenient moments for cheap scares and bad melodramatic moments. The filmmakers have created situations that defy logic and normalcy to advance a completely pointless story. Characters perform actions that defy logic. Events happen that defy logic. There is blood everywhere, yet no one seems worried about infection. And I can assure you, if blood is what you feel like seeing, this movie's carnage is on the heavy side. I'm not squeamish, and I actually enjoy a good gory film every once in a while. The problem with 28 Weeks Later is not the gore. It's the pointlessness of it all. I've seen some really bad films in my day. I've actually enjoyed some of those bad films. The problem with 28 Weeks Later is that it WANTS to be a great film. It WANTS to be a big budget gore-fest. With completely unsympathetic characters, it fails to create any bond with the audience. Even if the epileptic camera work gave us an instant of respite to actually relate to those characters. We are kept at a distance by terrible plot devices, terrible character development, and completely silly events.

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• A unique take on zombie films ruined for a cliché story and plot holes.

  Senor_Hugo2007-05-13

  This film sucks. The director used only one shooting style. Shaky-cam. If the director somehow ends up reading this review. Shaky cam shooting does not equal good, unique, or even an innovative shooting style. It's used by people who need to cover up their lack of a story with a confusing and erratic camera movements. Seriously, even the still camera shots and the pans looked as if the camera man was a retard who suffered from chronic epileptic seizures. Everything was shaky cam. The friggin credits were shaky cam for Christ's sake. Shaky cam should ONLY be used for documentaries(Grizzly Man), or reality TV shows, like COPS. Now, camera work aside, lets actually get into the story. With 28 Days Later we were presented with a unique take on zombie films. With 28 Weeks Later, we were presented with complete destruction of that unique take. They took a good story and turned it into your stereotypical zombie film. Not to mention, there were plot holes galore. Seriously, the plot holes were such in number, that the plot holes had plot holes. The story was so damned terrible. Small boy(who I swear on my life I thought was a girl from all the previews, and even looks like Hermoine(Harry Potter) if she was a dude, anyway, small boy shows up in England, and he has two different colored eyes, which he inherited from his mom, and is very "unique." Foreshadowing! Anyway, turns out the mom, who turns out to be infected as seen in the first 5 minutes of this god awful film, isn't actually infected. She had the virus but has a natural immunity. So shes a carrier for the virus, as her saliva can still pass it on. So as anyone with 1/10th of a brain can figure out the entire friggin' plot of the film from here on out. Boy has mom's genes, boy has natural immunity, boy = possible cure for the Rage virus. The dad goes and visits the mother who's in the medical facility, they make out, and thus he becomes a zombie and kills the mom. He not only becomes a zombie, but he's also a magical super zombie. Not only can he magically bypass a locked door, but he also shows up wherever the kid goes. He is like Jason, no matter how far you run away, drive away, fly away. He'll end up right where you are, in front of you none the less. Like I said, plot holes galore. There were so many plot holes, combined with the shaky cam, I had no idea what was going on during the film 90% of the time. Zombies magically appear on rooftops where snipers are and end up killing the zombies, even though they're on buildings with like 30 stories. A population of 15,000 people can fit into a tiny room, but then fill a field with zombies. The zombies are apparently so bad ass they can escape a firebombed district of London, breaking out of the zone, after the place was firebombed to hell and back. Not to mention, like I said before, the dad combined with shaky came = super zombie. He is fire proof, biological weapon proof, he can even easily kill soldiers who are highly trained in the blink of an eye, like he was Jack Carver from Farcry. This movie really is terrible. If anything, it would have been worth renting, and not paying $8 to see in theaters.

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• Stupid upon Stupid... the stupidity exhibited was incredible

  katalinajime2007-05-14

  I'm open to believe the U.S. Army is stupid- but THAT stupid? How do 2 kids get out of the "safe" zone and manage to steal a moped, ride through London, hang out at their house, and meet their mother before the Army can catch up with them? The purpose of putting the safe zone on an island in London was for containment (I assume) and yet, the survivors AND the zombies are able to walk across a bridge to get off the island AFTER it's been fire bombed? I am able to guess the mother's genetic eye-color trait is linked to the genetic anomaly that makes her and her kid immune- how does the idiot doctor not figure it out? Is the medical director really so stupid as to not guess these kids could be current hosts- is she really so stupid as to whisk the two kids away without checking their blood- and wouldn't doing a full work up on both kids be required when they were first caught? Is she so stupid as to risk her life to get these two kids out of Britain who can be carriers, like their mother was a carrier? And really... the father's reaction when he finds out his wife is alive... this is a man who should have severe PTSD (the entire survival population should have PTSD)... and he saw his entire nation succumb to this virus and yet he is ready to believe that his wife comes out of an attack unscathed? And then he sneaks through security to see her???!! Really??! And again back to the stupid U.S. Army-- you'd think security in that place would have been better...I get that he had "all access" pass, I just think the Army would have guards around too. Come on... the movie was so stupid upon stupid. Sorry to all the fans, I really liked the first one.

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• Well-done: Gripping and scary

  Andy44442007-05-19

  Having seen 28 Days Later I thought I was prepared for this, but I was not. Somewhere near the beginning of the film is a scene that goes from zero to psycho in about 2 seconds flat. The beginning of 2004's Dawn of the Dead also had a wildly chaotic kick-off scene, but unlike that film, which was a great film to laugh through while chomping your popcorn, this film is no laughing matter. When there's no violence, there's fear and tension. When there is on-screen violence, there is absolute shock and horror. Scene after scene shows ordinary people placed in impossible situations from which they cannot escape. This time, of course, there now two implacable predators out there hunting them down: the rage virus from the first film, and the military which is attempting to maintain control of any outbreak, but is willing to visit unspeakable horrors upon innocent people if they cannot keep that control. The horror and scale of the virus is so severe, that the plans the military implements are completely plausible. The actions scenes are masterfully done, effectively placing the viewer in the points of view of both the victims and the crazed, but still scarily human, zombies. The portrayal of the violence pulls no punches; people of all age groups and walks of life are destroyed without remorse. No attempt is made to soft-pedal it. The fragility of human life on Earth and its vulnerability to just the right nasty virus are thoughts that stay with you after you've left the theater, and add a nice "after taste" of fear. The soundtrack, as with the first film, is amazing in conveying the tension and dread and sadness of the scenes. The story is fairly tight, as well. My only complaints might be with the acting of some of the soldiers, which just didn't feel authentic to me for some reason. Overall I'd say this is one of the best zombie films I've ever seen, in fact, one of the most effective thrillers I've seen, as well.

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