The results of the virus are the infected. People who growl with beaming red eyes that run at almost lightning speeds and kill anything in their path and infect others by tearing them apart or vomiting blood on them. It only takes twenty seconds to become one, so they waste no time disposing of their friends. They stumble upon father and daughter survivors who decide to travel a military base where they supposedly have everything under control, but what they will find is not what they will expect.

Occasionally within the throws of watered down horror movies and thrillers, a movie and a director comes along and decides to completely re-write the way horror is done. Danny Boyle (director of Trainspotting, Shallow Grave, and The Beach) is one of those people who will undoubtedly change horror movies. This is possibly the most shocking and terrifying movies I've seen in years. Danny Boyle is genius because after directing freaky cult films like Trainspotting, it was a bit questionable to me if he could handle horror but he pulls it off well. The movie constantly changes into pastels of moods within it's canvas setting constantly going from light moods, ala the shopping scene, instantly cranking up the tension, ala the tunnel sequence. He can leave us smiling with delight and in a split second leave us biting our nails and cringing in our seats. He relies a lot on isolation to scare us, showing massively long scenes of lonely landscapes forcing us to feel even more terror and insecurity.

He goes for a long time without giving us any type of horror as we watch the characters interact with one another and cooperate within this post-apocalyptic world without anyone. Then, suddenly, he throws a lot of horror and gore at us relentlessly which makes it scarier because the violence is so rare that when it comes it's more terrifying. He dares to break the mold of the horror genre by masterfully giving us a range of moods and colors, and terrifying sequences non-stop. A lot of this movie reminded me of a Dario Argento film with the shocking opener that lets you know what's in store for you.

The movie actually gives us characters we can care about and the director helps us by exploring the psychological effects this horror is having on them. We see Jim, the coma patient, have dreams that he is alone and deserted; we can see the desperation within the father's eyes, and the torment in the daughter's. These are actually characters that we feel bad for and within a split second Boyle takes them away from us. Characters in this movie come and go and Boyle snatches them without hesitation. Boyle often drops the characters off in small cramped dark places making the audience even more nervous and more anxious as we know terror is looming but we can do nothing about it. The infected are horrifying as they stare with beaming red eyes and bloody faces and growl aloud; they can run and jump and dash and never stop. They also can infect someone by scratching them or vomiting oozing red blood all over the person which infects their victim within a matter of seconds, twenty seconds. Zombie movies have long drawn out sequences where we know someone is infected by the zombie and it takes them forever to change, but this wastes no time and instantly amps up the tension factor. We witness the transformation before our eyes and watch as they spasm and hiss and turn instantly.

The movie is more of a commentary on humanity and how we never really learn from our mistakes. We watch four people forced to live and exist in a world without order, a world with carnage, a world not very different from ours. When the people save Jim and explain that the government is basically non-existent he replies "What do you mean there's no government? There's always a government!" This forces them act upon themselves and begs the questions: In a world without order, how do you achieve it? Who decides what life should be like, and is it all ultimately futile? This shows what humans do when there's no structure or basis for order and basically take it upon themselves to do it with unsuccessful results.

The last twenty minutes of the movie is very gory and very intense as the entire movie comes to a close with bloody results, results that will leave you cringing and covering your eyes. I was often covering my eyes and groaning in fear as the last moments of the movie pretty much sum up the entire story in a very horrifying fashion. Danny Boyle got it right and proves he's an elite director that has yet to achieve the fame he so rightly deserves.