Movie Review: Doomsday

There are numerous movies with post-apocalyptic settings. Such as Independence day, 2012, day after tomorrow, 28 days later.. the list goes on. Doomsday, is a 2008 British sci-fi movie, set in futuristic Scotland. I guess I will say right at the start of this review that, if you can, avoid this movie at all cost, because it is probably one of the most boring and disgusting movies I've ever encountered!

The movie is pretty much a rip off of 28 days later. The story of Doomsday goes like this: In the future, a deadly virus outbreak in Scotland caused most of its inhabitants to die, there is no cure for this virus. As a preventive measure to stop the virus from spreading into the rest of the country, the British government decided to build a massive wall that segregate Scotland from the rest of the UK. Leaving all the inhabitants to die. The main Protagonist in the movie was a little girl who made it pass the wall just before they closed the wall off, all citizens in Scotland were presumed dead. 20 years later, the deadly virus was found again in London, and through satellite images, the government found survivors in Scotland, so they thought the survivors in Scotland must have found the cure. The government sent a team of special force agents into Scotland, the goal was to investigate and attempt to obtain the cure, lead by the main Protagonist. As the team made their journey to discover the mystery, a series of shocking events unfold...

So here you have it, a standard sci-fi story with inspirations from 28 days later. It would have been an average film, but there are so many things in this film that made it really bad. Firstly, there was a 5 minutes scene of cannibalism, where the camera showed a man being roasted alive, and then a bunch of savages started to cut, tear and eat flesh from the charcoaled corpse, all depicted in painstakingly great detail. It was really revolting, I remember I was sitting on my couch eating dinner when I watched this, and I almost vomited. Secondly, despite all the actions, this movie is terribly boring, as the plot unfolds it becomes more and more ridiculous and makes no sense. Thirdly, there is just too much unnecessary violence in this film, it's almost as if the director derives joy from torturing the audiences with overwhelming scenes of decapitated head, flying limbs and splattering of blood on the screen. Fourthly, there is nothing to think about after you watched the movie, all you get is a sick feeling in the stomach from the overdose of unrealistic blood and gore.

I think you get the picture now..

Score:

Story 1/5 - The story is a rip off of 28 days later, but at the same time it is so boring, sickening, flat and all in all uninteresting. Heck, they even use the soundtrack from 28 days later. Personally, I could not see any thing worth reflecting about from the story.

Cinematography 3/5 - In terms of colour and contrast, the cinematography is all right in this film. However, in terms of blood and gore, it is way over the top and extremely graphical.

Sound 2/5 - The sound effect is quite good, the volume for the dialogues are crisp, sharp and easy to listen to, but using a soundtrack from 28 days later? I mean, come on, they could have been more original than that!

Violence Extreme - To summarise the level of violence and gore in this film: I felt like becoming a vegetarian for a week after I endured this 2 hours long visual torture.

Sex/nudity medium - there was a frontal nude scene of a woman at the beginning of the film and that is all.

Final verdict 2/10 - Personally, I really think this is one of the worst movies I've seen in years. It will be on my chart as one of the worst movies ever made, just after John Travelta's Battlefield Earth and Edwood's plan 9 from outer space. Yep, it is that bad! There is just nothing in this film that can redeem itself from being horrendous and ridiculous. Strongly NOT RECOMMENDED.