2026, Nia DaCosta (The Marvels) -- download
Kent's view.
Weird. I didn't stub this with any initial commentary.
I really like this movie, probably more than the previous. I may have recapped the previous movie, but I didn't say much what I thought about, probably because I didn't think about it much. It presented itself, allowing us to come back to the world, almost as if it was entirely a setup for this movie, the one with meaning.
Meaning? More like contemplation.
So, Spike. Spike (Alfie Williams, A New Breed of Criminal) has hooked up with the Jimmy's, the scarred and scary track-suited hooligans in white wigs who turn out to be a proper cult, Satanism and all. Jimmy Crystal (Jack O'Connel, Sinners), the kid from the preamble in the previous movie, which showed a frothing-at-the-mouth (before he is even infected) minister allowing the infected to invade his church, something-something end of the world something-something. Jimmy is his son, a survivor. Jimmy has evolved into a frothing-at-the-mouth lunatic who believes his real father is Old Nick, or Satan if you wish to be proper. And their, the Jimmy's that is, goal is to bring more death & terror onto Jimmy's father than even the infected are.
Spike doesn't fit in, but he knows he has to survive somehow. Torture and terrorizing is not what Spike had in mind when he came back to the mainland. We get to know the cult, Jimmy Crystal's ethos and their methods. There can only be seven "fingers" which Jimmy states was the number of sisters he lost, but he's a loon so its probably an arbitrary number. No matter, Spike has to kill another member to get a place in the cult.
Meanwhile back in the Bone Temple, Kelson (Ralph Fiennes, Conclave) is studying Samson (Chi Lewis-Perry, Gladiator II), the Alpha who appears to have become addicted to Kelson's blow dart concoction. Kelson has been alone for decades and has given up any pretense of studying the rage virus properly, but in Samson's reactions, he begins to unravel a mystery -- what are the infected raging against. Sedated, Samson loses his anger, his desire to tear Kelson apart and/or eat him. They sit together, watching the moon.
Spike gets first hand exposure to the cult's tactics as they invade a farmstead and torture its members, under the pretense of "charity", this time choosing to skin them alive. Its a stomach churning scene made all the more disturbing by Spike just sitting it out, not really fighting back against it. Survival is one thing, by complicity... No matter, one of the victims turns the tables killing off some fingers before expiring.
Soon after Jimmy Ink (Erin Kellyman, The Falcon and the Winter Snowman) catches sight of Kelson and his iodine dyed skin, and assumes that must be the Old Nick Jimmy Crystal is always going on about. Remember, its been 28 years since the infection ended civilization on Great Britain -- these kids were all born after the plague. Jimmy Crystal is the only figure of knowledge & power they have known. And they are all so broken in their own ways, even Jimmy Ink who has a moderately protective response to Spike. So, in seeing Kelson/Nick she is simultaneously confirming Jimmy Crystal and challenging his whole belief structure.
And Jimmy is a loon, so what's he to do? Could this actually be Satan who talks to him in his own head? Or just a man who very obviously appears to be safe around an Alpha. Jimmy confronts Kelson, confirms the latter, but devises a ruse. They will play act out Kelson as Old Nick, and the Jimmy's will move along, leaving Kelson to his work.
It goes decently enough, with Kelson doing his best pantomime to the loud sounds of Iron Maiden music but when Kelson recognizes Spike under that ill fitting mop of white hair, he lets the guise down. He suggests the fingers should sacrifice Jimmy himself, crucify him as a great offering. Jimmy doesn't go down easily, and fatally stabs Kelson before overpowered by Jimmy Ink. As Kelson dies, they leave Jimmy upside down, a victim to the infected, to be torn apart as his fingers had done so many times.
Now, the crux of the scene is the arrival of Samson, a now calm Alpha, thanks to the administering of anti-psychotics by Kelson earlier. He is still the massive hulking roided monster of a man but his mind has returned to him. Kelson had determined, in the best parts of the movie, what the driving factor of the infection was, and has calmed it. Spike and Jimmy Ink, now revealed as Kellie, escape in the final scenes to be spied by.... well, a corny final scene.... none other than Jim from the original movie.
Now, when I say the best parts of the movie, it is those quiet but very tense scenes when Kelson interacts with Samson. Kelson has been alone for so very very long. He's a brilliant man but had given up "curing" the disease, given up being a doctor, and was now more a mortuary attendant, tending to the dead in his Bone Temple. So, he finds a friend in Samson, but also a finality of purpose when he finally cracks the disease's heart. Its not like he is going to save the world, as there is no more world on Great Britain. No one is going to discover his "cure", so its entirely personal, between him and Samson. Fiennes, a man generally displaying refined, precise characters is able to add so much to this rather barbaric depiction of a broken man in a broken world.
As Kent mentioned, this series could have devolved into repeated Straight To style exploitation sequels, and almost did with the second. But these two movies return it to something else. On the island of England, all is lost, so the stories we have are of people and challenges. I won't go so far as saying they have elevated to any degree, as these are still genre movies, zombie movies, but I applaud the attempt to do something different beyond the usual sequel-itis, repeating the first movie over and over again.
No comments:
Post a Comment