Ralph Fiennes in '28 Years Later: The Bone Temple.' Sony Pictures Share on Facebook Share on X Google Preferred Share to Flipboard Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Send an Email Print the Article Post a Comment You've got to respect the grandiose insanity of 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, a movie that has Ralph Fiennes' Dr. Ian Kelson proclaiming, "Pride moves inside me like maggots in the corpse of Christ!" That doozy of a line comes at the peak of a dark rapture in which the survivalist medic uses the monument to death he has spent years constructing out of human skeletons as a stage for an epic piece of performance art set to "The Number of the Beast." He's putting on a show for sure, but his level of commitment makes him a man possessed. This is a dystopian horror movie unafraid to mix an Iron Maiden antichrist anthem with dreamy Duran Duran synth pop in the trippiest display of bromance bliss you've ever seen. There's even a Radiohead art-rock mantra that seems to come directly from Kelson's mad-genius mind. Or at least from the eclectic vinyl collection he plays on a turntable powered by a hand-cranked generator. He's a man who appears to have prepared for an apocalypse of virally infected flesh-eaters as if he were invited to be a guest on Desert Island Discs. Related Stories Movies 'Primate' Review: College Kids Fight to Survive a Rabid Pet Chimp in a Slasher Movie That's as Enjoyably Nerve-Shredding as It Is Silly Movies Why Jamie Lee Curtis Is Thankful Her Mom Didn't Let Her Audition for 'The Exorcist' as a Child 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple The Bottom Line Whiplash-inducing but never dull. Release date: Friday, Jan. 16Cast: Ralph Fiennes, Jack O'Connell, Alfie Williams, Erin Kellyman, Chi Lewis-ParryDirector: Nia DaCostaScreenwriter: Alex Garland Rated R, 1 hour 49 minutes Do director Nia DaCosta and screenwriter Alex Garland make all this a coherent extension of the diseased near-future world created by Danny Boyle and Garland in three previous films, starting with 2002's terrifying 28 Days Later? Maybe not in the strict sense of everything being entirely germane to the core story. But if audiences can accept a sequel that has veered into something closer to folk horror than its zombie-adjacent roots, they should be able to plug into its peculiar wavelength. To start with the movie's strongest asset, Fiennes is magnificent - sinewy and feral in appearance but erudite in manner, his isolation and years of living rough having done little to curb the magniloquence of a posh education. Kelson is a man of science and an atheist, but not without a touch of mysticism. The film is most effective when it stages a clash between the doctor's radical but rational school of thought and the barbarism of paganistic religious fanaticism. (We'll get to that in a minute.) But before the fiery climax, there's a thread that's both poignant and daffy, involving Kelson's evolving connection with the hulking Alpha specimen of the infected (the word zombie is never used) he christened Samson. Played once again by Chi Lewis-Parry with literal BDE, Samson has gotten a taste for the morphine darts Kelson shoots when he's charging in for a kill, which allows first for tentative physical contact and then later for real communication, and possibly even a key to treating the Rage Virus psychosis. The rest of Europe has given up on the virulent disease, quarantining the infected to the British Isles and leaving them to stain England's green and pleasant land blood red. But Kelson has continued experimenting, finding a breakthrough that could lead to a potential cure when Samson becomes an unlikely stoner buddy. The doctor wants to know if memories of the man he was prior to infection still linger, or basic skills of language and understanding. "Or do I just give you peace and respite?" he asks, a touching softness in his voice. This sense of compassion for the kill-hungry infected is new to the series, and while DaCosta and Garland take risks by playing tender moments between Kelson and Samson almost for laughs, the undeniable pathos provides a welcome break from the overriding tension. The main narrative shift of this fourth installment, however, pulls the attention away from the infected to settle on a band of wandering Satanists led by Jack O'Connell's menacingly charismatic "Sir Lord Jimmy Crystal." Seen at the end of last year's 28 Years Later rescuing the young protagonist Spike (Alfie Williams), Jimmy sports a tiara over his long blond locks and wears a track suit with a lot of bling. He refers to his followers as his "fingers," all of them also named Jimmy and wearing shaggy blond Billie Eilish wigs in his image. These vicious youths fell the infected almost for sport, which undersells the source of terror so essential to the series. After passing a savage initiation test, Spike is accepted into the band but finds it hard to stoma