You Really Should Get This Scuzzy Lo-Fi Zombie Film On High-Def 4K
After more than two decades, 28 Days Later is finally getting a 4K remaster. But does it need it?
28 Days Later is hugely significant for many reasons: it was a key film in the 2000s zombie revival, it was a British production that competed with the best American horror films of the decade, and it was proof that future Oscar winner Cillian Murphy and screenwriter Alex Garland had long careers ahead of them. But in 2002, a digital revolution was brewing in mainstream filmmaking, and 28 Days Later’s scuzzy visual design — courtesy of Canon MiniDV camcorders and Anthony Dod Mantle’s cinematography wizardry — set it apart from every other horror movie in multiplexes.
But although a new 4K remaster of 28 Days Later—now available on a Blu-ray Steelbook—sounds like it contradicts this intentionally low-res spirit, the contradiction between clean and ugly textures is a perfect match for Boyle’s seminal zombie film.
How was 28 Days Later received upon release?
There is no modern zombie revival without 28 Days Later — despite Danny Boyle’s pedantry that it’s not a zombie movie, the film’s influence is clear on the subsequent Dawn of the Dead remake, World War Z, The Walking Dead, and I Am Legend. (Credit where credit’s due: writers Alex Garland, Edgar Wright and Robert Kirkman were all inspired by the original Resident Evil games.)
28 Days Later released in the United Kingdom seven months before it hit the United States, and the stateside release built on the strong box office and reviews from the British press (including a glowing recommendation from Mark Kermode). The film ultimately earned 10 times its small budget of $8 million and spawned a sequel in 2007.
Why is 28 Days Later important to see now?
Filmed on Canon MiniDV camcorders, 28 Days Later and a 4K remaster make strange companions.
In the early 2000s, digital filmmaking processes were not widely adopted, but whenever they were used, they made waves. 1999’s The Blair Witch Project was both colossally successful and shot on a consumer Hi-8 camcorder, while major productions like O Brother, Where Art Thou? and Chicken Run were notable for being the earliest films to be entirely digitally color graded. The summer before 28 Days Later’s release, Attack of the Clones had the honor of being the first Hollywood blockbuster entirely shot on a high-definition digital camera system. In the years to follow, the arguments for or against digital filmmaking focused on its ability to mimic celluloid, but 28 Days Later disqualified itself from this debate by using the least-35mm-looking images to sell its vision of an abandoned and corrupted Great Britain that had fallen to the incredibly infectious “Rage Virus.”
With two recent legacy sequels and one long-promised finale reuniting Boyle and Murphy still to come, 28 Days Later should require no elaborate introduction. Jim (Murphy) is a London courier who wakes up from a coma to find central London desolate save for the hordes of blood-spitting, hateful Infected waiting in dark spaces for fresh blood. He eventually finds temporary safety with hardened survivalist Selena (Naomie Harris), taxi driver Frank (Brendan Gleeson), and his daughter Hannah (Megan Burns). 28 Days Later is devoted to scenes of decline and rot — in hospitals, high rises, and highways — that are amplified by the imprecise and unpolished ways that the non-HD cameras capture light and depth.
But 28 Days Later is also full of juxtapositions, glimpses of constructed normality that feel uncanny in an apocalyptic world. Decked in Christmas lights, Frank’s apartment is cozy and inviting, and Frank hosts Jim and Selena with the warmth of a cheery neighbor. When the survivors find an immaculate supermarket, they fulfill their giddy trolley dash fantasies, loading up with supplies and treats. The final act’s setting of a country manor ran by army Major Henry West (Christopher Eccleston) stands in for aristocratic and military order continuing in this new world, until the soldiers reveal they want to keep Selena and Hannah as sex slaves, and the appalling violence needed to maintain loyalty and discipline in the fortress is revealed. The mirage of normality clashes with the reality of constant danger, and the insulated interior spaces that promise to keep out the apocalypse are defined by new twisted hierarchies or performances of kindly civility. No matter how effective they appear, a sense of unease and peril keeps knocking at the barricaded doors and reinforced walls.
28 Days Later was the first major release to really take advantage of digital filmmaking.
This juxtaposition approach is intensified by a Ultra-High Definition remaster. As you can see in side-by-side compilations, shots of London still look weirdly flat and eerie, but the upgraded detail and color control results in images that look both sharp and hazy at the same time.
Tonally, 28 Days Later lurches between implausible calmness and extreme agitation — both wide exterior shots and close-ups of gushing blood and white light bouncing off teeth-bared faces — so the film makes you feel constantly pursued and utterly alone in quick succession. Accessing this confused, contradictory world via images that split the difference between clarity and crumminess is an ideal way to revisit the 21st century's defining zombie film. In a physical media culture that fetishizes a super-clean and detailed UHD look, the dissonance of 28 Days Later on 4K might be an exciting new frontier.
What new features does 28 Days Later 4K Blu-ray have?
Sadly, the Steelbook is light on special features. The Blu-ray includes archive material like the original behind-the-scenes doc Pure Rage, and the film’s deleted scenes and alternate endings featuring commentary from Danny Boyle, plus animated storyboards and photo galleries. The only new feature on this steelbook is the UHD restoration itself.
