Zombie films are made by the dozen every year, but only a handful remain relevant in current times. While some zombie films are outright gimmicky, the other more serious ones tend to overly rely on horror’s mediocre tropes, eventually culminating in a dilution of the story.
Getting a zombie film just right isn’t an easy feat, but getting it right on a shoestring budget is nothing short of a miracle, and that’s exactly what separates genius from average. Danny Boyle’s 28 Days Later is a detailed case study of how to use the conventions of a genre to strengthen the narrative as opposed to making the convention the narrative.
MOVIEWEB VIDEO OF THE DAY
28 Days Later, as the name suggests takes place in London after scientists accidentally inject a chimpanzee with a virus known as rage. The chimpanzee goes berserk and chaos ensues. An abrupt cut to 28 days later, Jim (Cillian Murphy) wakes up in a hospital bed after a coma and finds his surroundings in an utter state of disarray. Confused, Jim roams through the streets of London looking for people and answers. He then meets a group of survivors and is briefed about the incidents that ensued during the 28 days he was in a coma… Together the band of survivors reaches a military base in rural England and that’s when the film comes to life.
Written By Novelist Turned Filmmaker, Alex Garland
20th Century Studios
28 Days Later is written by novelist turned-director Alex Garland, who later on went on to direct films like Ex Machina and Annihilation. A common argument that often comes to the surface whenever 28 Days Later is mentioned is it’s categorization as a zombie film. This is due to the fact that the virus depicted in the film doesn’t kill the host, technically making them undead. Garland clarifies this by insisting “It’s a zombie movie,” he says definitively. “Whatever technical discrepancies may or may not exist, they’re pretty much zombies.”
The only catch to this is the director of the film, Danny Boyle thinks otherwise, causing uproar within the various corridors of debate for film fanatics. The main point of contention regarding the film’s classification as a zombie film falls on whether the people infected with the virus are considered to be dead or alive. Keeping the technicality aside, the film’s story relays the fact that a virus breaks out and causes the infected to act out in an abnormally bloodthirsty manner, with the degree of how dead the host is being up for contention.
Much More Than a Mindless Zombie Flick
What makes 28 Days Later stand out from the rest of the mediocre films in the horror genre lies in its blatant disregard for the norms attached to a conventional zombie flick. For instance, instead of going the stereotypical route of having a macho alpha-male as the lead, 28 Days Later unravels the apocalyptic scenario through the eyes of a meek and docile character, instantly making the character more relatable and in turn adding more depth to the narrative.
Another significant factor that places 28 Days Later above its peers is its unwillingness to pursue mindless action for the sake of the genre’s requirements. The film rather acts as a psychological case study into the mind of a group of victims who must band together to outwit the enemy, provided they realize who the true enemy is.
When compared to other big-budget zombie films, 28 Days Later seems more like a story that consists of a group of characters with feelings and emotions, rather than a series of explosions strung together. Boyle and team creatively leveraged their obvious budget constraints to drive home the point that inner turmoil experienced by characters is far more entertaining than external screams and shrills.
Where normal zombie flicks falter, 28 Days Later comes to life. Boyle uses the backdrop of a zombie apocalypse to showcase the many facets of humanity, from unity to diversity, empathy to insecurity. The film’s narrative uses the dead or half-dead zombies as a trigger for humans to band together, but once together, humans become a significantly more potent enemy to each other than the mindless zombies ever could.
In most zombie films, the mindless, bloodthirsty monsters have a clear agenda — satiate their appetite by feasting on humans. Simply put, the film’s narrative tends to follow a mediocre, template-oriented structure; zombies are out to feast on humans, and humans must avoid turning into zombies by discovering a cure.
28 Days Later disregards this norm and juxtaposes humans alongside zombies. When viewed side by side, one is forced to compare the various attributes between the two. With the comparisons considered, the crux of the question remains. Who’s the menacing of the two, the one that kills because it cannot think, or the other that kills because it can.
