| Worth seeing: | for the discovery of Alfie Williams' young zombie hunter and Ralph Fiennes' eccentric doctor |
| Director: | Danny Boyle |
| Featuring: | Aaron Taylor-Johnson, Alfie Williams, Jodie Comer, Amy Cameron, Chi Lewis-Parry, Edvin Ryding, Geoffrey Austin Newland, Jack O'Connell, Ralph Fiennes, Rocco Haynes, Sandy Batchelor, Stella Gonet |
| Length: | 115 minutes |
| Certificate: | 15 |
| Country: | UK |
| Released: | 19th June 2025 |
WHAT’S IT ABOUT?
28 years after much of the world was ravaged by the Rage virus – turning people instantly into feral zombies – the infection has largely been contained to mainland UK.
With European navy ships patrolling the seas, a community of British survivors is living on a small island, linked to the Northumberland coast by a causeway that emerges only at low tide.
Twelve year old Spike (Alfie Williams) is ready for a big rite-of-passage, as his father Jamie (Aaron Taylor-Johnson) leads him to the mainland to kill his first zombies. His mother Isla (Jodie Comer) is confined to her bed, struck down with a disease that no-one on the island has the medical expertise to diagnose.
When Spike spots Jamie cavorting with a younger woman, he decides that the only people that matter in his world are him and his mother and when hears of a doctor (Ralph Fiennes) on the mainland, he sets out to try to get her the treatment she needs to survive.
WHAT’S IT LIKE?
Not quite 28 years since Danny Boyle first introduced us to the Rage virus, 28 days after animal rights activists freed infected apes from an animal testing laboratory, we discover that European navy ships are policing the quarantine of mainland Britain, where infected humans are now confined. 28 years on from the stunning and shocking site of major cities, emptied of life, healthy humans are now confined to a small but thriving community on Holy Island, off the Northumberland coast.
When we first visit the mainland as a rite-of-passage for 12 year old Spike, we discover that there are now two types of zombie on the prowl. “Low slows,” who – as their name suggests – are overweight, under-exercised, non-verbal beasts that crawl along the ground, tugging worms out of the soil with their mouths. Then there are the more familiar growling, screaming, upright zombies who stand on the horizon, waiting for a whiff of fresh human, before running after their prey, in their packs, under the watchful eye of their “alpha.”
Over the space of not 28 generations, but 28 years, half of these infected humans appear to have evolved into a new species. It’s visually arresting and narratively throws you off guard, but really? The Rage virus seems to speed up evolution too.
You also have to wonder why this population, that’s been thriving – presumably on the animals it finds on the mainland – needs to chase humans at all, if there is plenty of food for them anyway.
Then you have to wonder how the handful of healthy humans we meet on the mainland have survived all that time – essentially in isolation – and one in particular finds himself in the very strange position of having the opportunity to kill zombies but just putting them to sleep for a bit – until they turn up to try to kill him again. In 28 years, you’d think he’d have just given up and got them out of his way, so that a sense of normality might return to his life, as would normally be the aim of such a character – fighting against the odds to survive – but with little real purpose.
In 2002, with 28 Days Later, Danny Boyle redefined the zombie film and while he still knows how to ramp up the tension and deliver exciting chases and fight scenes, most of what happens during the course of this third film seems unlikely at best and nonsensical at worst. There are some nice touches – such as the alcohol-infused singing of what appears to be a traditional folk song but on a closer listen, turns out to be a Tom Jones classic.
One of Boyle’s greatest successes here is the discovery of young Alfie Williams, who looks set to reprise his role in at least one sequel.
With the film coming out against the backdrop of members of Parliament debating assisted suicide, there’s a particularly uncomfortable – and oddly sudden – denouement to one of the film’s sub-plots and with child sex abuse also being high on the political agenda, there’s a very creepy celebration of one of the most notorious abusers in the closing scene. Perhaps Boyle is trying to highlight how the world was a very different place 28 years ago – but he does it subtly in other parts of the film, making this feel like all the more like he’s mindlessly bashing us around the head.
A film about societal breakdown caused by a virus has all the more relevance in these post-Covid years and this portrays would might have happened if Covid had been as bad as some of the more extreme predictions.
But in what is ultimately a zombie film, the biggest shocks and the most uncomfortable moments should come from the undead – not from hagiographising child abusers or euthanasia campaigners.