Review: 28 YEARS LATER: THE BONE TEMPLE

 by Rob DiCristino

It’s more of a bone menagerie, but that’s neither here nor there.

Warning: This review spoils 28 Years Later, which, like, JUST came out.

Let’s see. We last left our friends from 28 Years Later in a bit of a state: After mourning his mother’s death and stowing the Miraculously Uninfected Zombie Baby safely within the confines of his remote island sanctuary, young Spike (Alfie Williams) has ventured back onto the British mainland only to be accosted by Sir Lord Jimmy Crystal (Jack O’Connell) and his band of ostentatious, Jimmy Savile-styled droogs. After besting one of them in a one-on-one knife fight that would make Paul Atreides proud, Spike is presented with a choice: Join the gang as one of Jimmy’s “fingers” — holy warriors who dispense lethal “charity” to the misbegotten wretches cursed to remain in this life after Satan unleashed the rage virus upon the Earth — or be shown charity himself. He chooses the former. Duh. Meanwhile, Dr. Ian “I Have a Bone Temple Because I’m Extremely Normal” Kelson (Ralph Fiennes) sedates and befriends a hulking Alpha (Chi Lewis-Parry) whom he believes still holds a shadow of his former humanity under all that spine-ripping, dong-flapping rage.

Written by series co-creator Alex Garland and directed by budding genre specialist Nia DaCosta — whose spunky drama Hedda was sorely underseen last year — 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is a curious beast. Not quite a spin-off and not quite a proper sequel — at least not one that follows the time gap structure of the previous films — this new entry functions more like the second half of last year’s 28 Years Later, corroborating the status quo it established before turning inward to explore its ideas with even more compassion and precision. The film sports just a handful of speaking parts — including Erin Kellyman, Sam Locke, and Emma Laird as some of the more talkative droogs, and Louis Ashbourne Serkis as a heroic everyman who fights back against them — and goes relatively light — by this franchise’s standards, anyway — on the kinetic action that has come to define the series. In place of those gory delights, though, DaCosta and Garland offer a thoughtful meditation on human savagery with a guarded eye toward the possibility of redemption.

That all begins with Fiennes’ gentle Dr. Ian, who built his ossuary — no; bone temple, dammit. We’re calling it a bone temple — to provide peaceful rest for people like Spike’s terminally ill mother (Jodie Comer in 28 Years Later), people from whom the apocalypse had stolen away any chance for the comforts of empathetic medical care. Dr. Ian’s generosity even extends to the infected, it turns out: Once he discovers that the Alpha is developing a taste for the opiate cocktail in his blowgun darts, he starts administering it in more, well, recreational doses. They become fast friends — Dr. Ian dubs the Alpha “Samson” for his massive stature and long, wild hair — which gives the good doctor the chance to develop a treatment that addresses the psychological aspects of the virus along with the physical ones. Even while adding these new wrinkles to the franchise lore, though, DaCosta and Garland keep their focus intimate and personal: This isn’t about saving humanity. It’s about one man — one gigantic, well-endowed man — recovering what he lost.

But as is so often the case, powerful light must clash with powerful darkness. Enter Sir Jimmy, the fanatical psychopath we met as a youth at the beginning of 28 Years Later. Both emboldened and haunted by the memory of a vicar father who welcomed the virus as a sign of the End Times, Sir Jimmy exercises a power over his droogs rooted in religious devotion, undiagnosed sociopathy and, for Spike and “Jimmy Ink” (Kellyman), anyway, basic survival instinct. While the original 28 Days Later made waves by introducing “fast zombies” to the genre faithful, the franchise’s most formidable villain may turn out to be its slowest and most deliberate, as O’Connell gives us a charismatic preacher who weaponizes his flock’s search for meaning in a meaningless world through quiet manipulation and vague assurances of a reunion with “Old Nick” — read: Satan — who will bless their brutality as righteous retribution against a world gone mad. These Jimmys weren’t born killers, but humans will do anything, even the most horrifying things, to feel like they have a purpose.

And if The Bone Temple sounds too heady and spiritual for the salivating gore hound in your life, rest assured that these forces eventually come to blows in a heavy metal symphony of flamboyant delight that more than makes up for the overall lack of zombie mayhem, a balls-out display of giddy, unbridled audacity that reminds us why things like “movies” and “acting” (and “bone temples”) exist in the first place. Nia DaCosta may have a lighter and more studious directorial touch than the handheld frenzy of franchise godfather Danny Boyle, but The Bone Temple proves that there’s more than one way to skin a post-apocalyptic, rage-infested cat. With future installments of blockbuster cinema’s most unexpected new legacy franchise all but assured — rumors of a pre-credits reunion with an old Irish friend are not the slightest bit exaggerated — there’s ample room for all kinds of new approaches. The question isn’t whether or not future 28 Years movies will be made. The question is whether any of them will have a title that rips harder than The Bone Temple.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple hits U.S. theaters on Friday, January 16th.