Truly Dreadful Film

the audience applauded

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

Great movie. Not sure what people expected but I found it highly entertaining.

I was really happy when the proper East End geezer joined the cast of EastEnders, I'd previously only seen two of his films, Human Traffic and Severance, with Halloween on the way I thought I'd try one of his horror films. Basically in the not too distant future leading pharmaceutical company Newgen Industries is in the final stages of testing its new "legal performance enhancer", RAK-29, testing has met with spectacular failure as the drug has caused physical and allergic reactions for over 30,000 test subjects, causing a media uproar. But the side effects worsen and test subjects become increasingly violent until they are nothing more than marauding beasts, and their bites are infectious, turning anyone bitten into flesh eating zombies like them. Dr. Michael Brooke (Del Henney) identifies only one test subject who has not turned into a bloodthirsty monster, pregnant woman Angela Mills (The Descent's MyAnna Buring), her immunity makes her the only hope to find a cure for the plague that threatens the world. Despite handing in his resignation to CEO Peter White (Colin Salmon), N-Gen mercenary and hardened killer Cole (EastEnders' Craig Fairbrass) is given the mission to find and protect Angela to bring her in for examination. Cole is joined by other survivors, including Joe (Danny Dyer), but Cole's mission becomes much more difficult when he is bitten himself, he injects himself with a drug that will slow the process of infection, but will Angela stay safe and sound to save the world from apocalypse. Also starring Jaime Murray as Lavinia, Shane Taylor as Geoffrey, Sean Pertwee as Rob and Mike & Angelo's Tim Whitnall as News Anchor. Dyer gets a little swearing as usual and acts a vague hero, but not much else, Fairbrass is tougher, and the other cast members do their stuff fine, the film certainly has a fair amount of blood, guts and violence to keep scary movies fans happy, but it is let down but a lacklustre script and a predictable story, a pretty pointless science-fiction horror. Adequate!

Craig "Dan from Eastenders" Fairbrass and Danny "Fahkin" Dyer star in a poor mans '28 Days Later' fast moving brainless zombie film set in London. Its the standard story of science experiment gone wrong causing widespread zombie infection, a group of survivors have to find away to escape after dealing with their own personal situations. The narrative is duller than dishwater and the acting is like somebody hand made marionette puppets and flung them around in front of a camera - it is that wooden. The zombies were fast and acrobatic so you'd think there may be some empathy shown towards the survivors but in truth I didn't actually care, Danny Dyer plays the same "can't be arsed" pseudo hard man he does usually so I struggled to care for him, likewise Fairbrass. Sean Pertwee's cameo is quite amusing but it's far too short, as he 'legs it' into the boat I kept hoping to see him again but alas not. There are a few moments that made me laugh but I'm assured the film was supposed to be serious, in that department it failed, more lame duck than happy quacker. The zombies in the film are quicker and cleverer than the story, this was unoriginal, unconvincing, and unamusing. This maybe a good film to anyone new to the genre but hardened zombie fans won't be excited.

East End wide-boy Danny Dyer stars in this low-rent copy of Danny Boyle's 28 DAYS LATER, with infected zombie types racing around London and chowing down on unsuspecting passers-by. The twist in this one is that the zombies employ parkour, well in reality one or two of the same ones do, but it's hardly of the calibre seen in the likes of DISTRICT 13. In fact it's a random gimmick that adds nothing to the production whatsoever.Dyer's thunder is completely stolen here by the presence of proper hard man Craig Fairbrass (CLIFFHANGER), playing a tough, Ray Stevenson lookalike who seems to spend the entire running time hitting zombies in the head with the hammer. Well, it's a way to make money. The production values are low rent but acceptable here, and there's certainly a fast pace to keep you occupied while the clichéd storyline plays out.The supporting cast incorporates familiar faces like TV's MyAnna Buring (RIPPER STREET) playing somebody who might just hold the key to the cure for the zombie virus. Elsewhere, Sean Pertwee and Colin Salmon turn up for brief cameos early on, while DOOMSDAY villain Craig Conway bags a good guy role for a change. The production is similar in scope to the other Fairbrass starrer DEAD CERT, with the trade-off being that the humour is missing in favour of slightly better production values. Whatever way you look at it this is hardly the stuff of greatness, but it passes the time for the undemanding fan and it's certainly far from the worst zombie movie out there.

Stop me if you've heard this before.A superdrug is tested inadvertently causes the patients to turn into mindless, rage filled… ummm… aaaaahhhh… zombies I guess. Coming into contact with fluids or being bitten by the infected allows the virus/condition/disease to be spread, leading to a massive contagion in the entire nation of Great Britain.Sound familiar? Well what about this? Only one patient seems immune to the negative symptoms – you know the flesh eating and general insanity – she is on the run, with various parties in pursuit to see if she holds the key to a cure.OK so Devil's Playground hardly breaks into new territory, but it has a couple of moments, not the least of which is the count the clichés bingo that can be played while watching.The reporter on the street being interrupted and killed on screen.The guy who repeats "Mum. Mum. MUM!" as his destiny shuffles ever closer, covered in blood and ready to teach the poor dumb guy a lesson in common sense.The guy who's infected and needs a cure immediately, only he lasts half the film without one while others who share a glass turn in 45 seconds flat.The whole 'but she's pregnant' bit.After the Zompocalypse © starts the infected immediately turn into parkour-ing Reapers from Blade 2, all leaping, snarling, unnecessary wall climbing menaces. They spill lots of blood and cause lots of gore all over the UK, usually with backdrops of carefully constructed carnage reminiscent of the Left 4 Dead video games.Devil's Playground is uninspired and formulaic and doesn't do much to separate it from a million other similarly bland zombie flicks. As much as I love zombies I can't help but think for the time being they are a little overdone, this isn't the film that will revitalize the genre, but I give a couple bonus points for at least trying to make the film look bigger and flasher than a lot of other low budget efforts.Final Rating – 4.5 / 10. So you say zombies are threatening the very social fabric of a nation again and it's up to a few individuals to save humanity? Wake me when it's finished will ya?