If you head over to the Letterboxd review section for 28 Years Later, among the praise, you will find a consistent complaint: that while the first act is “fantastic,” they find that the subsequent parts of the movie don’t live up to their expectations of the film.

I’m sympathetic, of course; it’s one of the creepiest and most well-edited trailers I’ve seen in some time and sells an experience that suggests it’s going to be terror all the way through. 

If you have not yet seen 28 Years Later, allow me to temper your expectations here so that you can avoid becoming one of these people who completely misunderstands the film:

Do not go in expecting nothing but tense horror/thriller energy from beginning to end. One of 28 Years’ greatest strengths is the fact it does allow itself to be that, but it also allows itself to be so much more.

That enough for you? Consider yourself tempered. Go forth and watch and come back when you’re done because I have more to say, and I need to spoil a lot of the movie to do it. 

MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD FOR 28 YEARS LATER.

(Note: this will not include discussion about the film’s ending because I frankly could not do it justice, nor does it fit in with the point I’m trying to make.)

This movie has two halves. Initially, I thought of them as “Father” and “Mother” as they are framed through the lens of main character Spike’s (played exceptionally by newcomer Alfie Williams) parental companions. But the film introduces two other concepts near its conclusion, perfectly encapsulating the two halves: “Memento Mori”, and “Memento Amoris”. 

During his time with his father, Jamie (a career-highlight performance from Aaron Taylor-Johnson), Spike engages in a particularly masculine coming-of-age tradition where he is taken across the Causeway – a bridge of stone only accessible during low tide – to the mainland, where he is required to make his first infected kills. It’s during this section we’re treated to an extended sequence using the recording of Rudyard Kipling’s “Boots” from the trailer – black-and-white footage of British warfare throughout history cut in with shots of the people of Holy Island training their young boys to become soldiers, while the women prepare for a party in Spike’s honour upon his return. The roles are seemingly well-defined: women stay on the island, and men go out to hunt.

During this section, we are introduced to the Rage virus 28 years after the outbreak. There are slow ones now, and still some fast ones, and a terrifying third type they simply refer to as “Alphas”, for whom the virus has apparently acted like steroids. Spike is instructed on how to use his bow and arrow on live targets, essentially forcing him to confront death for the first time as its bringer, as well as its potential victim. It is dangerous out on the mainland, and you must be strong and deadly to survive. 

“Memento Mori”: Remember death. Seen through the eyes of a father who pushes bravado and sells a story of glory, of the prestige that comes with protecting the homeland. I find it very interesting that it’s basically all men I’ve seen praising this half of the film, while disparaging the next as if they can’t quite conceptualise the horror of seeing a twelve-year-old boy in a situation that he should not have to be in, and refuse to engage when the film answers the horror of this first half with the introspection of the second.

Spike’s mother is sick. Isla (a Scottish name meaning “island” – I see you, Mr. Garland – and played to perfection by the ever-talented Jodie Comer) is introduced bed-ridden and raving, head pounding, screaming the C-word at her husband so many times I found myself questioning – not for the last time – how this movie only got rated a 15. Spike, sick of his father’s refusal to tell the truth about anything but especially what’s wrong with her, makes a seemingly ill-advised decision to break her out and off the island to go see a doctor he’d just learned about. 

Thus, the movie’s tone begins to shift. There’s still horror, yes – a particularly heart-pounding sequence comes to mind where one of the slow infected crawls up to Spike, fast asleep while he’s meant to be on watch, which helps to serve a further purpose in showing Isla isn’t nearly as mad as she has previously appeared (which is to say, she’s sick, but not necessarily a liability) – but as our focus shifts from “Father” to “Mother”, we’re also reintroduced to other people outside of the isolationist community that Spike grew up in and, as it turns out, they’re not all terrible. In fact, we are reminded of the virtue of kindness in a violent world.

The introduction of Erik – played by Young Royals actor Edvin Ryding, a navy man who gets stuck on the island after their recon boat gets dashed on the rocks – reveals to us that the rest of the world has simply… moved on. Britain has been left to its own devices, but technology and culture continued to evolve. And while he’s not a nice man (“I know a dick when I see one,” remarks Isla in one of her more lucid moments), he does manage to save Spike and Isla’s lives, and it’s his turning away from an act of kindness that leads to his demise.

The biggest tone shift, however, comes in when we finally meet Ralph Fiennes‘ Dr. Kelson, who you’d be forgiven for thinking seemed terrifying from the trailer. But he isn’t. I’d go as far as to say he’s sweet. I certainly wasn’t expecting the bone monuments seen in much of the promotional material to be indicative of something genuinely… beautiful. 

Danny Boyle‘s understanding of drama and pathos shines through as we learn Kelson has been creating this monument of skulls and bones to honour all the people who have lost their lives to Rage or each other over the years. He takes Erik’s head – ripped off by an Alpha after Isla helped an infected pregnant woman give birth to an uninfected child (life/death juxtapositions anyone?) – and strips it, cleans it, bleaches it, and tasks Spike with placing it on the monument. It should be grotesque, and I think in the hands of lesser storytellers, it would have been, but instead, it begins the most moving piece of cinema I’ve seen in some time.

Isla is dying, it’s revealed. She has cancer, which has metastasised throughout her body and brain. With the country the way it is, there’s no cure for her to be found. Here, Kelson tells Spike about another term, sister to memento mori:

“Memento Amoris”: remember you must love. 

Grief in film is very important to me. Treating death with the honour and dignity it deserves is something I resonate a lot with, so when I say I sobbed as Isla gave Kelson a nod to drug her enough to give her a peaceful death without pain, the two of them walking off into the night’s mist, before Kelson came back with her newly cleaned skull and tasked Spike with giving it the most special place at the top of the monument, turning her eyes toward the rising sun…

That’s the point. This film could have been non-stop violent death and screaming, but the 28 franchise never needed to be about that. 28 Days Later showed us a world not long in the aftermath of catastrophe, but 28 Years takes into account the time that has passed. There is a status quo, an established understanding of the new world, and it takes great pains to explore beyond the surface level.

Instead, it reminds us that our connection to the world is each other, even when isolated, and that we should protect the ones we love while remembering that everyone else is just trying to do the same. We must remember death, but we HAVE to remember to love. And if that idea ruins a film that manages to balance all of these ideas with a level of grace and skill we should be studying, then I don’t know what to tell you, but maybe you’re the kind of person this film is trying to make a point about.

What did you think of the film? Let us know down in the comments!