28 Days Later movie review

So last night I decided to re-watch 28 Days Later, which I haven't seen in years. This movie at its time was kind of a fresh take on the zombie movie, the premise of the movie is that in a medical testing facility a virus was created that causes animals to go into a blind murderous rage. During an action taken by an animal rights group to liberate the animals and destroy the testing facility, people are infected with the rage (passed though bite, and blood contact), and well this movie happens 28 days later, after the virus has spread. I say that this is a fresh take on the zombie theme, because instead of rising from the dead and feasting on the living, the infected don't actually die first they just become creatures led by their rage. The actual story of our heroes start as Jim our male protagonist wakes up naked in a hospital, after being unconscious for weeks. The movie then goes into this amazing post apocalyptic scene as Jim wanders through the abandoned streets of London, with an indie music soundtrack playing, the scene almost has the quality of an artsy music video, and I must say I really enjoyed the beauty of this scene. One thing that does bother me about this scene, is that Jim walks through an abandoned city in his hospital scrubs (which at least he put those on so we didn't have to see more shots of his floppy balls bouncing around), but seriously the city is abandoned one of the first stops I would have made would to a clothing store to get some damn real clothes and a good pair of shoes. So this scene like I said just plays out beautifully, until Jim decides for whatever reason to stop in to a church, where he finds it is full of dead bodies. He then calls out "hello" because I guess that is what you do to a room full of dead bodies, and then we get our first glimpse of the creatures. I am not going to give anything away here, for the one or two of your who haven't already seen this massively popular movie, but shit gets crazy, and he flees, and ultimately ends up meeting up with our leading lady, as well as a teenage girl and her dad. The characters are all likable, and relatable, and it seems to do a decent job of developing the characters and their relationship without going into boring back stories, the movie does a good job at keeping to the story at hand, and I think that works well here. The movie is also not just a post apocalyptic zombie movie, but it actually has some things to say about humanity, without getting overly preachy. I love the theme in monster movies where the the viewer is posed with the thought of, "who are the real monsters", you will understand when you get towards the later half of the movie. The DVD also comes with three alternative endings, which I think the best of which, was the one used in the actual cut of the movie. This is actually a very well done horror movie, and I like that it is a more realistic take on the zombie movie genre, because realistically I could see if a "zombie" apocalypse were to happen, it would be as a result of chemical weapon testing done on animals. The actors I feel all were perfectly cast and did amazing jobs at playing their roles in a believable way. The movie is fun, the movie is also challenging at points, and can seem almost hopeless at times. I like that the movie doesn't rely purely on gore for its horror elements, and there are psychological terrors as well, the horror elements though graphic, and intense were at the same time pretty tastefully done. I can see why this movie helped to revitalize the zombie movie genre, it was a fresh breath of life that was needed in the horror genre back in 2002. Also this movie doesn't feel dated, and is just as effective of a horror movie now as it was when it was made. This movie is actually really well done in all aspects. Would I recommend this movie? Absolutely, I do think that this is a movie that all horror fans should see, I think it has all of the elements of a great horror movie, and was beautifully executed. I wouldn't rank it among my favourite movies or anything, but I am definitely happy that this is a part of my collection, and will probably give it a view again in another ten years.