catapult magazine

Anyone see “28 Days Later?” If so, did you think it was an art flick or what? I thought it started out as an art flick (or more like an art flick) and then ended up with a political message the size of a billboard.

I saw it as more of a social commentary rather than a political message, but I can certainly understand what you mean. I really, really liked the movie and apparently they’ve re-released it with an additional ending, i.e. after the original ending a title card with the words “but what if” comes up followed by another, darker ending. Is this the version you saw, mrsanniep?

I didn’t see the alternate ending one – just the HELLO “looks like we’re going to be rescued” ending.

What message about society did you get from the movie?

I guess I wouldn’t call it a message about society (even though that’s almost exactly what I called it in my earlier post!). I appreciate how the film asks us to consider the delicate nature of our institutions and whole civilization. It certainly does this through the initial premise (the human population of England and possibly the world being wiped out by a man-made virus), and even more effectively later, when our heroes meet the members of the military outpost near Manchester and things begin to go very awry. It’s fascinating to see this group of men, who are attempting to start civilization over again, go so wrong.

I definitely think the movie was telling us that humanity doesn’t have a prayer – be it we wipe ourselves out via a virus (think ebola fever, SARS, monkeypox, etc.) or turn on each other in a moral sense, similar to the Manchester soldiers and the other survivors. Night of the Living Dead had a similar message of “America devouring itself” when it came out during the Vietnam War.

I liked the movie more up until the soldier part. I liked the art film touches – the dangling phone receivers, the religious music during bloody scenes. I liked the set-up – learning about what was going on as the characters did, etc. Once they hit Manchester, though, I didn’t like it as much. It seemed to sell out.

Quite a unique film. The confusion of it reminded me a bit of ‘Requiem for a Dream’. I liked the abstract way of communicating violence.

I think I would agree with mrsanniep that the film took a downturn when they reached Manchester. It seemed like the director abused the soldier characters to get his message across..

The ‘what if’ ending really seemed more consistent with the overall feel of the film. It was hopeless. Basically seemed to say that humanity can’t continue without rape and violence.

I believe I heard Danny Boyle say that this is more a response to British unilaterism and its insistence on not joining the EU. Odd response, I would say.

Yes, it definitely seemed anti-soldier. It didn’t occur to me at the time that it was anti-soldier, because it seemed logical to me that soldiers might respond to a crisis in this fashion (bunker up and remain uninfected) and that civilians would seek them out. Their violence towards those civilians, especially the women … again, didn’t strike me as restricted to only soldiers, but anybody (or any male, in the movie’s case) who hadn’t seen a woman in 28 days and was convinced they were the last of mankind unless they procreated. Considered in the context of what Danny Boyle said … the anti-soldier perspective makes sense.

One thing I liked about the movie was the airplane the guy saw after he escaped.

I didn’t feel any chemistry between the two main characters, however, and thought the “love story” thrown in at the end was lame.

I was just pissed that I didn’t get to work on this one. I was so stoked working on the trailers and then Fox Searchlight decided not to add DTS to the format. I hate them now for doing that to me.