Eye Candy #26 - "Doomsday"

Doomsday: Back in the late 70’s-early 80’s, a whole sub-genre of film sprung up around apocalyptic visions of the very near (at that time) future. ‘Escape from New York”, the “Mad Max” movies, “The Warriors”, all perfect examples of the style. It seems that the 21st century has spawned a whole sub-genre of apocalyptic visions of the UK. “28 Days Later” and its sequel, and now “Doomsday”. This film leans heavily on that genre and John Carpenter specifically (down to the near incessant background synthesizer music and use of odd pieces of incongruous music like really loud can-can). This is the most recent offering from Neil Marshall, who gave us the great, great “Dog Soldiers” (and almost half the cast is in this picture too) and “The Descent“. The plot: Scotland has been quarantined due to a lethal virus and has been a no-go zone for 30 years, with the rest of the UK huddling south of a gigantic metal wall that divides the country. Rhona Mitra is Eden Sinclair, a police officer tasked with going over the wall into no man’s land to rescue a scientist that may have the key to curing the virus. The problem is the remaining survivors beyond the wall are about two steps removed from Lord Humongous, and are fractured between two different violent factions. One group has gone all “Lords of the Flies” and the other has gone medieval. Literally. Quite a few names in this one: Bob Hoskins, Malcolm McDowell, Alexander Siddig, and the immortal Sean Pertwee. It clips right along. I watched the unrated version and it’s very graphic and violent. However, the film’s biggest flaw is the lead and the reason the box office was so small - no one is going to say “Hey, you wanna go see that new Rhona Mitra film this weekend?” because most people don’t know who she is. Woodchuck sez, “Check brain at door and you might enjoy all the homages.”