1/21/26 - 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple This movie is kinda sickening to be honest. like, they *really* go for it. it's horror in a similar way that cronenberg's Dead Ringers is horror; you will be made queazy. you will squirm. And i really loved it, this weird, unexpected second punch of a one-two combo. i really admired the first 28 Years Later as a thoughtful zombified bildungsroman, but other than some impressively whacky photography i didn't get much of a kick out of it. they were saving the thrills for part 2. maybe not the thrills... the debauchery. horror fans aren't just adrenaline junkies, we're masked degenerates that The Bone Temple caught peeking. But don't let me paint the movie as pure perverted wish fulfillment. it's not pandering at all. the Blood Meridian-esque black hattery of jack o'connell's psychotic "Sir Lord Jimmy Crystal" and his band of Fingers is stomach turning and captivating and purposeful. the anxiety it causes is critical to the film's central argument. it plays on-screen as the racked inhaling before the glorious exhales that take place at the titular bone temple.
Because the secret identity of this movie is stoner buddy comedy. the buddies are ralph fiennes' Dr. Kelson and a brawny long-membered morphine-addicted alpha zombie named Samson (played brilliantly and up-close by Chi Lewis-Parry). Extended sequences of them zoning out on poppy together. Samson stares and grunts, Kelson laughs and sings, they dance together. it's glorious. Dr. Kelson's compassionate rationalism anchors the existential angst of the first 28 Years Later, so naturally the sequel hinges on foiling and stress-testing that steadfastness. hence the satan-worshipping Jimmy Crystal, and hence the long sequences of crazed blood-thirsty depravity. there's a real debate taking place between the inhales and the exhales. it's not explicit enough to be tiresome, but it cradles so many of the riskier decisions in a sense of meaning. to some degree i suppose it justifies our thrill-seeking. And there's this outrageously kick-ass scene near the end that i don't wanna spoil but DAMN what a showstopper. || derek
wrote about The Bone Temple which i loved and it was honestly like no biggie #adhdismysuperpower #blug
