October is a rare month for boys. That’s what author Ray Bradbury reminds us at the beginning of both his novel, Something Wicked This Way Comes , and the movie that was made from it some twenty years later. Bradbury (1920-2012) was a celebrated grandmaster of science fiction, fantasy and dark fantasy--writing novels, short stories and screenplays throughout the better part of the twentieth century. He would also write The Martian Chronicles, The Illustrated Man, and Fahrenheit 451 . Something Wicked This Way Comes started out as the short story Black Ferris . Bradbury later turned it into a film script, but when plans fell through, he adapted the script into a novel, publishing it in 1962. Taking place in a small town in the early 20th century, SWTWC deals with a pair of boys who face a malevolent force that seeks to destroy everyone and everything they hold dear. Will Holloway (Vidal Peterson) and Jim Nightshade (Shawn Carson) are best friends who are innocently enjoy...
With 28 Years Later , director Danny Boyle returns to the zombie saga that he began with 28 Days Later. The direct sequel, 28 Weeks Later , was directed by Juan Carlos Fresnadillo. At the end of 28 Weeks Later , the zombies were busting out of England and sprawling onto the European continent. But in 28 Years Later , the “zombies” (who are still-living humans infected with a rage virus) have been pushed back into England, and the entire British Isles has now become something like New York City in John Carpenter’s Escape From New York : a vast wasteland that has been placed under quarantine by the outside world. But the British Isles are not all gloom and doom. A small village of non-infected humans are thriving on an island off the Scottish coast. Despite being shunned by the rest of the world, these hardy people have formed their own way of life and customs. They’re protected by a natural causeway that connects their island to the mainland--a causeway that sinks below the ...