I had the chance last weekend to watch “28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” — an extremely unusual but delightful film. Many, including myself, saw the first in the series, “28 Years Later,” last June. Just thinking about the last installment, viewed on a balmy summer night, made walking to see “The Bone Temple” in -13-degree wind chill just a touch more tolerable.
Unfortunately, it seems most moviegoers decided to sit this one out. “The Bone Temple” performed markedly worse than its predecessor at the U.S. box office, grossing $30 million — just a hair more than “Melania.” It is now being quietly ushered out of theaters after a mere three-week run. There are several reasons for this, not the least of which being its title. By giving it a name nearly indistinguishable from its predecessor without slapping “2” at the end, “The Bone Temple” sounds more like a Netflix spinoff than a genuine, theater-released sequel. Moreover, by spending little on advertising and releasing it in January — the “dump-month” for second-rate movies — it’s doubtful most people who saw the first “28 Years Later” last summer even know “The Bone Temple” exists. This is a tragedy, because “The Bone Temple” is one of the most intellectually curious movies you won’t see in theaters all year.
To fully appreciate this sequel, viewing “28 Years Later” is a prerequisite. While the two films were shot simultaneously, they had two sets of writers and directors. Danny Boyle — the creative force behind “Trainspotting” and “Slumdog Millionaire” — spearheaded the first film, while Alex Garland and Nia DaCosta wrote and directed the second, respectively.
While “28 Years Later” was an admirable “Frankenstein’s monster” of horror, drama and coming-of-age tropes, it sat just below the threshold of greatness. The film follows Spike, a 14-year-old living on a remote Scottish island 28 years after a zombie virus ravaged the U.K., as he ventures to the mainland to seek medical help for his dying mother. Boyle and Garland created a captivating movie, but one stifled by wild tonal swings. Moving from slapstick to gory horror to kitschy sentimentality in the span of minutes made the film feel unbalanced, as if it were searching for an identity it couldn’t quite grasp. It is analogous to Boyle throwing ideas — like darts — at a target: most hit the mark, but the ones that missed crashed noisily to the floor. The film was largely anchored by Ralph Fiennes’s near-mythical acting chops as Dr. Kelson.
Thankfully, in “The Bone Temple,” Fiennes is elevated from a supporting player to the lead. Garland does a good job stripping the sequel down to the bone. “The Bone Temple” focuses on Dr. Kelson’s relationship with the undead world he inhabits. The jump scares and nauseating zombie deaths largely take a backseat to Kelson’s almost lighthearted quest to befriend the “infected” — soundtracked by an excellent vinyl selection of Duran Duran, Iron Maiden and Radiohead.
By committing to a dark comedy — rather than a horror flick masquerading as a coming-of-age story — the film ensures each joke lands with great precision. The moments of emotional weight feel organic rather than forced. Truly, the most unrealistic part of “The Bone Temple” isn’t Kelson’s best friend being a hulking “Alpha” undead named Samson; it’s that Kelson somehow owns Radiohead’s “Kid A” on record in a universe where the vinyl revival never occurred.
“The Bone Temple” is a blueprint for how Hollywood should go about sequels. Instead of the banal formula of making more elaborate, convoluted installments, more filmmakers should strip the original down to the elements that made it great and run with them — leaving everything else by the wayside. Marketing may become more challenging, but truly noteworthy works will always rise above the rest.
“28 Years Later: The Bone Temple” is unlikely to win any Oscars — but this is not for lack of merit. It is the epitome of a film unjustly destined for obscurity because no one — including the studio that produced it — wished to give it a chance to succeed. But perhaps that is part of the allure: It doesn’t need any critical or commercial recognition to be a great film. It is more than capable of standing on its own, even if it has to do so with the cursed label of “box office bomb.”
Opinion articles represent the views of their author(s), which are not necessarily those of The Dartmouth.
