In28 Days Later, the main character, Jim, encounters other survivors, including a woman called Selena, a teenage girl called Hannah, and her father, Frank. The four travel together and become like a family unit as they try to find a safe haven from the infected. Frank somehow manages to remain hopeful and optimistic, even in the face of the zombie apocalypse.

When the group arrives at their destination – the supposed location of a military facility – and they find it empty, Frank loses his cool and his optimistic outlook shatters, just for a moment. They’ve gone through so much to get there and all of their hopes were riding on finding safety. They have no other plan. In his frustration, Frank storms off, searching the abandoned camp for any signs of the soldiers and coming up empty. Dejected, he sits down and a crow begins to caw. Because he’s already upset, the bird irritates him, so he scares it away by kicking the metal structure it’s perching on. This disturbs the corpse it was eating, hidden above. A single drop of blood falls into Frank’s eye, infecting him with the Rage Virus and giving him less than a minute to say goodbye to his daughter before the infection takes him.

In King Lear, the tragedy arises from the fact that the king brings about his own fate through his errors in judgement (and the same is true of Gloucester). In Frank’s case, if a zombie had randomly ambushed him and he’d died, it would’ve been sad. But the way his death comes to pass makes it tragic. We feel pity and sorrow because Frank is a nice man – not only Hannah’s father, but a father figure to the whole group. But we also feel fear because we know that we could just as easily lose our temper under such circumstances and make the same fatal mistake. Frank’s death is unlucky and unfair. But crucially, it’s also his fault, making it that much more painful.

And that’s why watching 28 Days Later is like watching King Lear. 😊

The four-minute sequence described above can be watched here on YouTube (although it’s full impact is felt in the context of the film as a whole).