28 Years Later:
The Bone Temple

5 outta 5

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is the weirdest entry in the 28 Days/Weeks/Years series, and considering how weird this series gets, that is saying something. This film picks off immediately after 28 Years Later and, even though it is quite connected to the previous film, this has a darker, stranger identity. This series is always bringing excessive amounts of gore and tension and heartache along with gaggles of Infected tearing people apart. This delves deeper into the nature of evil and if even gigantic killing machines can be redeemed. And the answer is, maybe? But a lot of splatter happens first.

On the rage virus infected U.K., young Spike (Alfie Williams) has been taken in by the roving band of murderous psychopaths all named Jimmy. Their leader, Jimmy Crystal (Jack O’Connor) calls the gang his Fingers and sacrifices random folk as an offering to Satan,. When Spike inadvertently kills one of the Jimmy’s defending himself, he gets thrown a blonde wig and renamed Jimmy. Their brutality is sickening to Spike and he is looking for a way out, and one of the Fingers, Jimmy Ink (Erin Kellyman) has sympathy for the kid. Meanwhile, Doctor Ian Kelson (Ralph Fiennes), living at his giant and disturbing looking Bone Temple, is continuing to observe the Infected, and he manages to subdue a giant Alpha Infected he’s named Samson (Chi Lewis-Parry). After he dopes Samson up with morphine (and a little taste for himself to ease the tension) Kelson starts to believe he can communicate with the giant brute. But the arrival of Jimmy and his Fingers may cause Doctor Kelson’s entire world to be shattered to pieces, rather violently.

Spike spent a lot of the last movie looking after his mother and realizing that his dad was kind of terrible, so Spike went off on his own. Thankfully, Spike’s scumbag dad never returns, and there has probably been enough of him in this story. Spike took his mom to see Doctor Kelson where the young lad was taught a lesson about remembering those who have passed by Kelson. Musing on mortality intentionally clash violently with the Jimmy gang, who are utter raving psychopaths, so the disorientation and fear that Spike feels works well. While Williams’s Spike figured out how to handle a bow and kill Infected in the last film, he is mostly just scared in this movie. Even though she is a Finger, Jimmy Ink slowly develops sympathy for the boy, leading to some interesting choices in the final climactic confrontation.

Kelson has turned out to be a really interesting character. When he was introduced in Years he comes across as batty until he reveals that his Bone Temple structure is a Memento Mori, a tribute to the dead from the Infection. Here he, bizarrely, becomes friends with the giant Alpha Infected, Samson. Trying to reason with an Infected seems futile, and at first Samson is charging at Kelson with murderous intent like all Infected are. But as Kelson keeps tranquilizing him with a morphine dart and talks and dances with him. Kelson is looking for a glimmer of humanity and it’s downright shocking when there is a hint of something inside there. Samson’s evolution throughout the film is fascinating as the bits of humanity come back, but he’s still a rage Infected Alpha and could be prone to tear off some heads at any moment. Which he still does, repeatedly.

There are a lot of monologues Kelson does to Samson and Fiennes always conveys a depth of emotion. Kelson doesn’t get to talk to people much, so he’ll even talk to a non-responsive Alpha. The scene when Kelson first talks with Jimmy Crystal as Jimmy shows flashes of his humanity as he is confused about thinking about the old world, and how his family died, as Kelson listens with a caring nature. But then Jimmy Crystal says that Kelson must do something incredible to convince the Fingers of Crystal’s lies. What Kelson comes up with is bizarre, hilarious and awesome. The movie’s soundtrack is great with some amazing song needle drops, and the scene with Kelson is the best.

Jimmy and the Fingers are very crazy, and they’re really good at disposing of the Infected as nuisances. O’Connor puts in another fabulous horror movie performance after being the baddie in Sinners, and Jimmy Crystal is a sadist who leads his people with his cult of personality. They do some really horrible stuff, a barnyard scene of skinning alive is really messy, so even in the brief moment when Jimmy Crystal seems like a normal human to Kelson, it seems inevitable he’ll turn back into a monster. Crystal’s exit from the movie is pitch perfect and downright cathartic.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is concerned with the horrible things people will do to each other if / when society collapses, and what one charismatic psychopath can do to influential pawns. There are still some great Infected bits here, and the evolution of what the virus does is fascinating. At the heart is Kelson, and even though he made a city of bones to live in, he is a symbol of light in the darkness.