New Moon is nothing if not an international advertisement for the hungry virtues of virginity and young people can’t get enough of it
The Twilight Saga: New Moon
Theatre
A smart, prickly and rewarding view of sexual and emotional confusion
Cock
Restaurants
Kitchen W8 is a bargain for this area, if such sophistication is what you crave
Kitchen W8
Too long and drawn out but very entertaining with excellent special effects
This is a peculiar play and does not work for me. Some of it is very funny but there are real flaws
Alex has a strong powerful voice and was faultless, she is far better now than she was on the X-Factor
London,
Nick Curtis's rating
Reader rating
28 Weeks Later: the eyes have it
Fighting zombies can be such a pane
This stunning sequel matches Danny Boyle's 2002 London horror hit 28 Days Later in almost every way.
Boyle's original startled with its images of rampaging, blood-spewing cannibals, maddened by a virulent infection, chasing the few unaffected survivors through an eerily empty capital. The follow-up, directed by little-known Tenerife-born director Juan Carlos Fresnadillo, deftly moves the story on and makes more familiar sights in our city seem alien.
Fresnadillo's masterstroke is to imagine that, seven months on, the infected have supposedly starved to death, and a US-led task force is supervising an experimental repopulation of Britain in a quarantined zone: the Isle of Dogs. Soaring aerial shots of the ghostly old city contrast with the tanks and snipers in Canada Square.
In this hostile atmosphere, we see Robert Carlyle's Don touchingly reunited with his two children. But another infection in this family, Don's guilt at abandoning his wife to the f lesh-eaters, triggers a re-release of the sleeping virus.
From a grim horror the film mutates into a pacy adventure. Don's children, played by the remarkably assured if improbably named newcomers Imogen Poots and Mackintosh Muggleton, must flee through the old, derelict London, both from the newly infected and from soldiers intent on burning away all trace of the botched repopulation. They are accompanied by a "pretend" family, a renegade doctor and sniper (Australian Rose Byrne and American Jeremy Renner) until the denouement at Wembley Stadium which, visually, is alone almost worth the price of admission.
Fresnadillo's film works neatly on many different levels, subtly tapping current anxieties about infection and the threat from within. The hand-held camerawork in the scenes involving the infected makes them a less unnerving threat than in the original, and Fresnadillo's tampering with London's geography will leave him open to sniping from nerds for years. But these are minor cavils with an effective, exciting horror flick, a great London movie, and a sequel that's an equal.
• 28 Weeks Later is released on Friday, 11 May.
Details are correct at the time of publication - please check with venue before booking.
Sounds great, and I can't wait until it opens here.
- John Degiovanni, Yonkers, NY, USA
I saw the film last night at the Premiere and loved it! I'm not usually into horror films, but I really enjoyed this.
It's amazing to see all the empty London streets and a very neglected Wembley Stadium complete with long grass!
Go and see it, but don't expect to have any finger nails by the end of it!
- Rachel Newton, London, UK
Morning:
14°c
