28 Years Later: The Bone Temple

If 28 Years Later which came out last year was startling in its visual imagination, its cinematic leaps and its sublime use of Ralph Fiennes's talent, this second part is more contained and less ambitious. As long as Fiennes occupies the screen as Dr Ian Kelson, 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple is at its most powerful.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple serves as a fantastic sequel to last year's film and basically improves on that film in every single possible way, delivering one of the best zombie films of the last decades and elevating the horror genre to a new level.

Nia DaCosta's direction breathes fresh energy into the franchise as the focus shifts from zombies to intense human conflict, with Ralph Fiennes, Jack O'Connell, and Alfie Williams at their best.

28 Years Later: The Bone Temple justifies its place within the franchise's storied lineage, but it falls short of delivering the visceral impact and narrative depth that would elevate it beyond a competent sequel.

The fourth entry in an ever-more engrossing franchise is absolutely bonkers — and a triumph. It mixes dark, queasy disembowelment and laugh-out-loud humor in a way that both subverts the genre and leads a way out of it, too.

The quaternary film, 28 Days Later: The Bone Temple, does the same, pushing the boundaries of the genre by questioning whether the transformation of an infected person is reversible, exploring the collapse of order in society and tackling the idea of a false God. Though tonally different from the previous films, it is rich in visual splendour.