Movie #2 - 28 Weeks Later

First of all... I would like to comment that on a Friday night, the only thing boring married couples or those in long term relationships do is rent movies. If you go to your local videostore, you will see what I mean... however, what is sad are those that go there by themselves... because they have nothing better to do. Wait a second... that used to be me, so that's not sad at all. Its fantastic!!!

Anyways, I was greatly disappointed by this sequel to one of the better horror movies done in recent years. 28 Days Later was a wonderfully shot movie, which was well cast and did not have a tremendous budget. It showed how horribly wrong a government science experiment can go and the effects it could have on major populations. It was a great commentary on the current state of our society and our unpreparedness for what is a possibility (pandemic, disease, starvation, etc.) but an accelerated pace.

28 Weeks Later is far from it. Although, like the original... the opening scene of this movie is awesome. Its an intense 5-10 mins that ensures that people are in their seats if watched in the theatres. After this... the movie is a tremendous letdown.

There are some cool pan shots of downtown London, England completely empty and there are some eerie shots of the streets and famous landmarks with no people. I found this quite compelling in the first movie, but this was somewhat overdone in the second movie.

The score was once again a great piece of music. Not only did it setup up gruesome set pieces in both films, but it was used as a gloomy undertone to what was to come...

I didn't like some of the violent scenes... there was too much violence in some of the more pivotal scenes and confusing violence in others. There was more commentary on the influence of the military (I believe the producers of this movie are commenting on the occupation of Iraq and Afghanistan) with scenes of military martial law and when they execute a Code Red order to exterminate all living people on the Isle of Dogs.

I liked the concept of this movie, focusing on repopulation and the efforts that the U.S. military and NATO would be doing if something like this were to occur. However, even in a horror movie where unbelieveable things are permitted to happen, I didn't find this movie believeable.

Although it gave me a good scare in some points, I was quite disappointed by the final product. There were many things that needed to be worked on in this movie. Without seeing the recent Resident Evil sequel, I would have to think that the producers made a horror movie with more explosions and CGI scenes to compete with this flick than to create another character driven horror story like the original 28 Days Later.

Overall, I still give it 2 M's out of 5. I would've reviewed this more poorly... but zombie-esque movies are a favourite genre of mine in the horror category, so I am somewhat biased.

If you are going to watch this movie... make sure you enjoy the first 10 mins of it, for the rest of it falls flat!