Danny Boyle has urged film fans to get themselves to cinemas to “support the apocalypse” because he needs decent box office numbers for his new zombie movie ’28 Years Later: The Bone Temple’ in order to finish the trilogy.
Danny Boyle has urged film fans to head to cinemas to “support the apocalypse”.
The filmmaker has revived his ’28 Days Later’ zombie series with a third instalment – ’28 Years Later’ – which is due for release in June and a fourth film ’28 Years Later: The Bone Temple’ has already been shot ahead of a planned 2026 launch date, but Danny has now admitted he wants to finish the series with another movie but finances for the project will be dependent on decent box office numbers.
According to Cinemablend, Danny made a plea for fans to hit cinemas to support ’28 Years Later’ during his turn on stage at the CinemaCon event in Las Vegas, saying: “We’ve finished the first film, we’ve shot the second, however, we don’t have finance for the third yet.
“[Sony Pictures Chairman/CEO Tom Rothman] seems like a nice guy, but he hasn’t given us the finance for the third, and that’s where [exhibition] comes in.
“So please, do us proud in your cinemas on June the 20th and support the continuing apocalypse.”
Danny directed the first movie ’28 Days Later’ and he returned to helm ’28 Years Later’, but ’28 Years Later: The Bone Temple’ was directed by Nia DaCosta with Danny as a producer.
However, the ‘Trainspotting’ moviemaker hopes to be back in the directing chair if the final movie is given the green light.
The series was created by Alex Garland – who wrote the screenplays for all the films except for second instalment ’28 Weeks Later’ – and started with Cillian Murphy’s character Jim, who awakes from a coma to discover Britain has been plagued by a terrible pandemic known as the Rage Virus, which turns those affected turn into murderous zombies.
During his appearance at CinemaCon, Danny teased the character could make a comeback in future.
He told the audience: ” Like all good things in life, you may have to wait a little while for him to make his appearance.”
Danny added of the franchise: “I still love an apocalypse, British-style. I still love the infected. And I still love blowing s*** up.”
Speculation about Murphy’s on-screen involvement in ’28 Years Later’ began after fans spotted a zombie in the trailer which many thought looked like the ‘Oppenheimer’ star.
However, it was later revealed the zombified character was played by Angus Neill and Murphy won’t feature in ’28 Years Later’.
Danny previously admitted he didn’t think fans would mistake the walker for Murphy, telling Empire magazine: “I showed my girlfriend the trailer and she said: ‘People will think that’s Cillian.’ I said: ‘Don’t be silly.’ I ignored her. So I’ve eaten a bit of humble pie since.”
Producer Andrew Macdonald went on to explain to the magazine that Murphy is still involved behind-the-scenes and may appear in later instalments.
He said: “We wanted him to be involved and he wanted to be involved. He is not in the first film, but I’m hoping there will be some Jim somewhere along the line.
“He’s involved at the moment as an executive producer and I would hope we can work with him in some way in the future in the trilogy.”
Danny Boyle urges film fans to ‘support the apocalypse’
