[7]

28 Days Later is a bright feather in the multi-colored cap of director Danny Boyle, who also gave us Trainspotting, Sunshine, and Slumdog Millionnaire. Cillian Murphy wanders post-apocalyptic England after a virus has turned most of the population into zombies. Boyle’s twist on the zombie sub-genre is speed — the zombies move like lightning. 28 Days Later unfolds very nicely and builds to a smart climax where the living dead actually become the least of Murphy’s worries. My only problem with the film is that it’s shot on video instead of film, complete with pixelation, crushed blacks, blown-out whites, desaturated colors, and a general lack of image detail. Unless it was for economic reasons, I’m not sure what Boyle was going for, especially since there’s no diagetic reason for the film to look this way. At the same time, it’s refreshing to see how good a movie can be when it was shot on what appears to be consumer-grade equipment.