The movie Danny Boyle called “impossible to pigeonhole”
There are definitely differences between a zombie apocalypse and the Vietnam War that served as the backdrop for Francis Ford Coppola’s Apocalypse Now, but there is a firm connection between the two, and it’s one that was brought about thanks to the 28 Days Later franchise directed by Danny Boyle.
Boyle has for most of his life stuck to the belief that Coppola’s movie, the infamous 1979 epic that ran wildly over budget and was beset with issues including its lead, Martin Sheen, having a heart attack midway through filming, is not just one of the best movies of all time, but that its director essentially serves as a prophet for all other directors.
In fact, it was Apocalypse Now that sparked his love of movies and desire to be a director in the first place, as a 21-year-old who at that point had only worked in theatre productions. After viewing Coppola’s masterpiece, Boyle felt he had been “sandblasted by the power of cinema” and set out on a career that began with Shallow Grave in 1994, exploded thanks to 1996’s Trainspotting and made the first 28 Days Later movie in 2002.
His debt of gratitude and love for Coppola and Apocalypse Now still runs deep, and he told author Robert K Elder: “This movie is impossible to pigeonhole. It’s the greatest war movie ever made. There are greater movies that condemn war, but no film captures our abhorrence of war and yet the pleasure we get from seeing it depicted in the movies. That’s what’s extraordinary about it. It’s not just a war movie, it’s about the nature of cinema and why we go and watch it – that journey we want to make in the cinema.”
While Boyle hasn’t made a war movie outright, there were certainly themes of war in the third and most recent instalment in his zombie franchise; this year’s 28 Years Later, which starred Jodie Comer, Aaron Taylor-Johnson and Jack O’Connell. It was a moderate success and received good reviews from critics, but wasn’t on par with some of Boyle’s biggest movies, Slumdog Millionaire, for example, which won eight Oscars in 2008, or 2015’s Steve Jobs biopic, which picked up two.
Boyle spoke more about Coppola and Apocalypse Now, saying: “The ’70s produced some amazing directors in America. Truly amazing, who moved cinema forward in ways that I think history will appreciate even more than we do, but to produce films like The Godfather and Apocalypse Now marks him out as a true prophet. I met him once, and I was just jelly meeting him.”
Boyle’s next movie will be an adaptation of the West End play Ink, again starring Jack O’Connell, which tells the story of the birth of The Sun newspaper at the end of the 1960s as Rupert Murdoch attempted to out-sell the Mirror by poaching staff, stealing ideas and introducing Page Three girls as the British tabloid race took off.
He’s also slated to direct a Michael B Jordan movie called Methuselah, which is a sci-fi action epic telling the biblical story of a man who has lived to 1,000 years old and spent it developing unparalleled survival skills. January will also see the release of 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, a fourth movie in the series, which Boyle will serve as producer on, with directing duties going to Candyman’s Nia DaCosta.
