In 2001, Danny Boyle had a problem. To make their new post -Arapokalip horror movie, 28 days laterHe had to capture pictures of then unknown Cillian Murphy wandering the abandoned streets of London. Turn off the city was not an option for low-budget production, however, and no one recreated it in a studio set. Instead, the 68-year-old director made a surprise choice: he filmed with light, low-resolution canon digital cameras. The technology, which was most advantageous at the time, made it possible to record scenes at iconic places like Westminster Bridge and Piccadilly Circus in less than an hour each. It also gave 28 days later Its unique grain appearance, which distinguishes the film even today.
Nearly three decades later, Boyle faced a similar dilemma. As its title suggests, 28 years later It occurs exactly 28 years after the initial explosion of a zombie-like “angry virus.” Left of the rest of the world, a quarantined United Kingdom has returned to its natural state, even during pockets of people and zombies survive. To bring that vision to life, Boyle again had to rely on light cameras to film in places that he would usually not be able. But this time the place was the unbridled desert of Northumbria, and the camera was an iPhone.
“Filming with iPhones allowed us to move without huge amounts of equipment,” Boyle tells Wired. “Many Northumbria looks like it would look 1,000 years ago. So we could move quickly and lightly to areas of the countryside that we wanted to keep their lack of human impression.”
28 years later It’s a full-circular moment for Boyle, in more ways than one. The original film made its director, best known at the time for dark comedies as Trainspottinginto a genre-auditor car. But in the decades since then, he has resisted reviewing this post -Apocalypse activity, Mostly sitting the aftermath of 2007 28 weeks later. His return, settled partly by the Covid-19 pandemic, which brought Boyle’s vision of empty London, takes the franchise in some wonderful directions, both of which set up Total new trilogy and manages to tell a beautiful story of life, death and the cloudy covenant between parent and child.
For Boyle, these were all valid reasons to rexaminate the world he created with screenwriter Alex Garland. But there will never be a wrong time to make this movie – even if the time limit feels particularly in the context of our own Apocalyptic Reality.
“The appetite was not diminished for apocalyptic stories,” Boyle says. “Is this because we are in the worst times, I don’t know. Of course, the horrors of the world haven’t diminished since we made the first movie. If something, they worsened, and they bleed in the movie, whether it’s the terrors of war or the terrors of infection.”
Prior to the film’s release, Wired talked to Boyle about why it was now the perfect time for a sequel, the advantages and disadvantages of shooting on iPhone, and why he couldn’t wait 28 real years to release 28 years later.
“The poor man’s bulletproof”
Earlier this month, IGN released behind-scene glances 28 years laterrevealing a massive platform capable of note 20 iPhone 15 due to Max cameras (all equipped with special accessories) at their theme. Speaking to me about Zoom, Boyle explains how this smart table, organized in a semicircle, allows the director to capture complex activity scenes from multiple corners at a time.
“It allowed us to do what is essentially the poor man’s bullet,” he says, referencing the effect innovative of The matrix. But during The matrix Used bullet-time to depict its physical challenging battle, Boyle’s goal was to capture the brutality of his world. “We use it for the violence. It was initially and unexpectedly depicted sometimes.”
