User reviews

"Devil's Playground" is basically a complete rip-off of Danny Boyle's 2002 horror masterpiece "28 Days Later". Same basic concept; fast-moving infected (not actually zombies as such)on the loose in modern day London and a group of individuals trying to escape the horror, fighting amongst themselves on the way. The one thing it doesn't borrow from it's source material is any level of intelligence. The characters are melodramatic clichés and way too good-looking and well-groomed to be in any way realistic; even though it's a low-budget British film it unfortunately follows the crap Hollywood template of shallow, unbelievable, glamorous leads stuck in an increasingly over-the-top set of action-based scenarios. Still, if you just want to watch something empty-headed and fun then it's not all bad. The stunt sequences are well done and the movie is nicely shot, with some fantastic views of London on display. Don't take it too seriously and you'll have a good time.

Although I imagine this is a straight to DVD affair, I caught this film on the big screen, followed by a Q&A with the director, and other members of cast and crew, who seemed very proud of their work.

During the showing the film got a few unintentional laughs which led a member of the cast to comment afterwards "I didn't know we had made a comedy zombie film" - No you didn't, you made a film which for the most part was extremely dull, with a wafer thin story and unconvincing characters. The laughter in the audience was due to the poor delivery of meagre lines of script and cliché plot developments.

With so many zombie films out there, you need a new angle to stand out from the crowd, and it was the directors belief that this comes from the fact that the zombies are free runners. To be fair, although free running zombies is only one step forward from the speedy zombies of the Dawn of the Dead remake and 28 Days Later, it's not a bad idea and I was fairly enthused with the idea of seeing this slight new twist. However I was soon to be extremely disappointed that although the film was being sold with this as its unique selling point, this wasn't exploited at all. Yes, the zombies (which mostly just looked like young people in hoodies) ran fast, jumped and vaulted over cars and other obstacles in their way a few times, but I was left thinking is that it, could they not jump and twist off a few buildings or do something well a bit more visually exciting?

The fact that this aspect of the film didn't live up to the hype was only compounded by the complete lack of interesting story. I never bought into any of the characters, especially the lead (played by Craig Fairbrass) who for me has no screen presence whatsoever. Within half an hour I couldn't care less whether any of the characters survived, and the zombies were so uninspiring that I couldn't even root for them.

On the plus side, I thought the film was well shot, with some cool images of London just about stopping me nodding off from boredom a couple of times. Plus there was a genuinely funny cameo from Sean Pertwee (the best part of the film). Shame that his character was never to be seen again, his story might have been more interesting!

It's interesting how influential Danny Boyle's 28 DAYS LATER was . It wasn't apparent at the time but from that point onwards each and every zombie film must feature zombies , sorry "infected" who can outrun Usain Bolt while having the endurance of a marathon runner . It's also noticeable how many zombie films there are with a massive number of short films and films on The Horror Channel featuring zombie apocalypse . Perhaps most notciable of all is how poor most of them are . and with hindsight Boyle's film was much better than I thought it was on first viewing . This inspiration called DEVIL'S PLAYGROUND is better than most of its peers but that's probably down to a simple reason it's a conscious rip off from Boyle's original

In its favour and considering its cast it'd be a very easy route to take and treat as a Lads Mags horror comedy with lots of nudge nudge wink wink humour testing the patience of its prospective audience . One thing I did like was the dead pan serious tone and while it's hardly big budgeted it does its utmost best to paint a convincing infected outbreak that took place unseen in 28 DAYS LATER . One of the rejected plots for 28 WEEKS LATER was having a SAS platoon rescuing the Prime Minister from the infected outbreak and once you're aware of this rejected screenplay you're able to see how this scenario would have played out on screen . Replace the PM with someone who has a possible immunity to the infection and replace the SAS platoon a more diverse group and you're left thinking that Boyle and Garland got it riht with the version of 28 WEEKS LATER that did make it to the cinemas . Not to be too hard DEBVIL'S PLAYGROUND it's much more enjoyable than I expected it to be and has been one of the better films The Horror Channel has shown recently

Despite the fast paced action scenes I managed to be bored bored BORED(!) after 40 minutes. The story is so straight lined and clichéd that you can't even be bothered to hope for any twists, and the only character who's slightly believable and sympathetic is Craig Fairbrass (Cole).

Don't get me wrong. I'm a huge zombie(/virus) fan, and I am aware that you don't necessarily need an amazing script nor 100% believable characters to make an entertaining zombie movie. But if you have neither and you don't have a single new interesting idea – well maybe you should just donate the money for charity instead of wasting it on another dull movie. People seem to compare this with 28 days/weeks later which apart from all of them being British and (relatively) low budget is blasphemy in my ears. In my opinion; if you like 28 days/weeks later – go watch them again instead of wasting your time on this one.

A very low budget action/horror Brit flick featuring freerunning mutant zombie flesh eaters. Craig (Cliffhanger) Fairbrass and Danny (just about every recent cheapo-diamond-geezer pseudo-Arthur Mullard C-Grade megatrash straight-to-video Brit movie in recent years) Dyer take the leads.

The script and dialogue are pretty darned atrocious and the acting is sub-primary school nativity play standard. But, the pace is frenetic, the action violent and unrelenting, and it is a bit of mildly diverting fun. Plus, considering the budget must have stood at around £7.80 and a bag of chps, the convincing representation of London in the midst of a zombie apocalypse is fairly well rendered and quite suitably atmospheric.

There's plenty of punching, strangling, bludgeoning and shooting of the freerunning mutant zombie flesh eaters, and the very fact that the makers thought a Resident Evil type of virus McGuffin with the side-effect of gracing the stricken with parkour skills was a workable creative advance on the "28 Days Later" formula, makes it quite hilarious to watch at times.

Worth a look if you've nothing better to do. A cheerfully trashy time-waster.

I sat through this bum-fluff at the recent GoreZone Festival in London's West End and almost lost the will to live before the opening credits had rolled. The prologue featuring bargain-basement 'action-man' Craig Fairbrass woodenly spouting even more wooden dialogue at the camera as a prep for the sub '28 Days Later' 'Rollercoaster' to come, made my heart sink faster than 'The Detonator' ride at Thorpe Park, and quickly proved its pedigree as a very bad omen for things to come.

Despite the first half hour containing a few nods to the guilty pleasures of Tobe Hooper's 'Lifeforce', there is little to no fun to be derived from this joyless and dispiritingly derivative Brit-Horror that scrapes the bottom of the 'Zombies-what-can-run' barrel into the dirt.

Accomplished camera-work and Sean Pertwee's hilarious cameo stave off some of the boredom, but a hopeless script and Danny Dyer's pathetic attempt at an emphatic hero put debut director Mark McQueen's puny entry into this exhausted genre deservedly into the dustbin of the underachieving undead.

A film based on zombies that move quicker than most (but not all) zombies from other movies is not a good premise for a story. It's not even the seed of a story. Even their own blurb says:

"DEVIL'S PLAYGROUND is a cutting edge British horror film that features zombies portrayed by free runners for a terrifyingly authentic representation of the undead."

There are so many things wrong with everything in that sentence, but mainly the word 'authentic', as if the filmmakers spent time documenting those pesky reanimated corpses which litter our streets, sprinting and leaping about everywhere.

This is barely a movie. I could criticize it further, but you can simply choose any word like 'acting' or 'directing' or 'script' and put it next to the word 'terrible'. This will save you time. The two stars is for a good title. If you want to watch free runners pretend to be zombies, you have my sympathy.

The plot: After a new, experimental drug causes people to turn into acrobatic zombies, a brooding bruiser searches for the one person who can provide a cure.

Devil's Playground is a derivative and generic zombie movie, but I still enjoyed it. It's basically a ridiculous excuse to show lots of gore SFX and stunt work, the dialogue and acting are often cheesy, and it's undeniably a ripoff of modern "fast zombie" movies (especially 28 Days Later), but if you're in the mood for a B movie, this will satisfy you. If you're expecting it to be original (or even fast-paced), you're sure to be disappointed. It seems assembled from scenes of other zombie movies, but the scenes are competently directed, even if the dialogue and acting are occasionally a bit cheesy. It doesn't really have anything insightful or original to say, but it does manage to throw in lots of impressive stunts. If you're looking for a movie about flesh-eating acrobats, I think you'd have a difficult time finding a better one than this.

It's difficult to recommend this movie, but undemanding genre fans may enjoy it, despite the flaws. It's worth a view if you don't need anything better than a moody atmosphere, some B movie actors, and a simple plot. It's no classic, but it's a cut above the typical direct-to-video zombie movies that I've been watching lately.

Stop me if you've heard this before.

A superdrug is tested inadvertently causes the patients to turn into mindless, rage filled… ummm… aaaaahhhh… zombies I guess. Coming into contact with fluids or being bitten by the infected allows the virus/condition/disease to be spread, leading to a massive contagion in the entire nation of Great Britain.

Sound familiar? Well what about this? Only one patient seems immune to the negative symptoms – you know the flesh eating and general insanity – she is on the run, with various parties in pursuit to see if she holds the key to a cure.

OK so Devil's Playground hardly breaks into new territory, but it has a couple of moments, not the least of which is the count the clichés bingo that can be played while watching.

The reporter on the street being interrupted and killed on screen.

The guy who repeats "Mum. Mum. MUM!" as his destiny shuffles ever closer, covered in blood and ready to teach the poor dumb guy a lesson in common sense.

The guy who's infected and needs a cure immediately, only he lasts half the film without one while others who share a glass turn in 45 seconds flat.

The whole 'but she's pregnant' bit.

After the Zompocalypse © starts the infected immediately turn into parkour-ing Reapers from Blade 2, all leaping, snarling, unnecessary wall climbing menaces. They spill lots of blood and cause lots of gore all over the UK, usually with backdrops of carefully constructed carnage reminiscent of the Left 4 Dead video games.

Devil's Playground is uninspired and formulaic and doesn't do much to separate it from a million other similarly bland zombie flicks. As much as I love zombies I can't help but think for the time being they are a little overdone, this isn't the film that will revitalize the genre, but I give a couple bonus points for at least trying to make the film look bigger and flasher than a lot of other low budget efforts.

Final Rating – 4.5 / 10. So you say zombies are threatening the very social fabric of a nation again and it's up to a few individuals to save humanity? Wake me when it's finished will ya?

There's only one diamond hard bloke that is grisly geezer enough to terror-twit the zombies in 'Devil's Playground, and that's Danny 'The Zombie Nutter' Dyer! Yet another blindin' British horror nightmare that has ignominiously slipped through the capricious celluloid cracks of horror fandom! Come on, son!!??? Dreamboat Dyer is a legit horror cult hero, and he gets nish all respect, mayte! Gore-blimey, geeze!!! Alongside the proper dapper, skull-mashing, Dolly-smashin' Dyer, you have muck-mouthed, mutton-faced maniac Craig Fairbrass tearing precipitously through these crusty zombie r-soles like a sketchy curry!!! It's a right tasty B-Movie Brit-banger, bruv!!!! 'In this 'Devil's Playground' only proper wrong-uns survive, mayte!

Not a fan of Danny Dyer, his attempts at being an 'ard man are cringeworthy, but he is tolerable in this fun virus infected maniacs film. I think they did a great job for the low budget. Some good bloody deaths and some attempts at character development too. Human nature and survival, betrayal. Far worse films out there and for a cheap UK film it's good. Shot in 25 days!! Well done to cast and crew for getting that much done in such a short time and budget.

If Danny Dyer was hoping this film would improve his star-rating then he's surely mistaken. This film is dyer(dire) sorry couldn't resist.

I love a good zombie-flick, but this isn't it. Bad direction, bad storyline, bad acting even worse script. There are no redeeming features to this boring, slow, limited action movie. Best avoid it if you can, be warned Danny Dyer's cockney scowl doesn't an actor make. When are film makers going to realize this guy is useless, and doesn't warrant the attention given to him.

Walk away, don't waste your time - painting your garden fence and watching it dry would be more entertaining than this drivel.

It's not a bad thing to steal from successful franchises. Resident Evil the Game (and the movies of course) got their idea from a few movies themselves. But the problem is, you have to have something endearing or something that the viewer will want to see. And it does not count if you check a list. Those things really have to be in the movie, instead of just putting them in there.

The main actors, I've seen him this year in "Dead Cert" too, has not enough of screen presence to hold the movie. Danny Dyer does his "schtick" (I'm starting to understand why some people do dislike him, though I wouldn't go that far ... it's a shame though, that he seems to just do it for the money ... it looks and feels like it certainly). Overall not a bad movie, but also not really good. Can be enjoyed with some mates ...

The world succumbs to a viral/zombie apocalypse as group of Londoners try their best to survive and are torn to protect one person that holds the cure.

Mark McQueen's direction is more than sufficient and effective coupled with ominous lighting, realistic settings and great special effects. While the 'zombie' supporting cast are worthy of note and the make up well designed, the free running style infected is unnecessary and distracting.

Brit actor Craig Fairbrass (Cliff Hanger) gives a typical performance as hard-man Cole. The rest of the cast are adequate, notably MyAnna Buring, but there's not enough meat on Bart Ruspoli's script or character development keep them busy to show any talent. The flawless Jaime Murray is sadly wasted with a little amount of screen time and even cockney favourite Danny Dyer the diamond geezer doesn't get enough to say.

If you must draw comparisons, it's pale against the likes of 28 days later or Dawn of Dead (2004). But to its credit Devil has a crisp atmosphere and eerie London setting.

Overall, generic, yet, a lot more watchable and entertaining than many of the DTV zombie/virus flicks that are being churned out.

(38%) Yet another modern zombie flick that has nothing new to add at all, there's almost no reason at all why anyone needs to see this; yet somehow I oddly kind of enjoyed this cheap, simple, decently packaged fast zombie slice of throwaway B-movie fluff. This attempts to follow on the footsteps of the much better 21 days later with the zombies infected with some sort of chemical, only here the scientists featured are wholly incompetent with their 100% fail rate resulting in the zombie outbreak. Low end British star Danny Dyer plays (shock horror) a tough London crook, though he isn't really the main focus here which is on quite a wide assortment of little known faces. There's plenty of what most people want from a film of this type (blood, zombies getting smashed up) which is enough for a half recommendation, though there's nothing else here of any value whatsoever.

I've seen a couple reviews here that call this a 28 Days Later ripoff, but honestly it's more of a UK ripoff of Resident Evil. It opens with a major corporation creating an enhancement drug that has the unfortunate side effect of turning people into zombies. So, while it's definitely not winning any points for originality, it still makes for an entertaining zombie action romp.

It has a really good and competent cast that includes Jaime Murray, Danny Dyer, MyAnna Burying, Colin Salmon (who was also in Resident Evil), and even a small bit for Sean Pertwee, the effects are good, production values are all fine, the dark scenes aren't so dark that you can't see what's happening, and it's got a decent amount of gore without going overboard. If you're looking for the a post-apocalyptic zombie drama, this probably isn't for you, and I'd instead suggest films like 28 Days Later, Open Grave, The Girl With All The Gifts, Here Alone, and anything from the Romero oeuvre, but if you want more of an action style survival horror zombie flick without getting wrapped into a big franchise, give this one a shot.

Its a low budget blood fest...entertaining from start to end...

If you like horror,action and zombie movies....You cant really go wrong..... watched it expecting a cross between "Dawn of the dead"(2004) and "28 days later".....and thats just the impression i came away with...as a person who loves nearly all movies, i can't fault it...

Have seen many worse movies..... many,many worse......ha ha

The acting was good, not too wooden....and the characters were not too clichéd either...

Now all i need to wait for is "walking dead" to start and i'm sorted for TV as well...

A company's experimental performance enhancement drug turns it's subjects into hyper zombies. Only one of their test subjects seem to be unaffected and a search is on to find her since she may be the key to perfecting the drug or finding a cure. In the mean time, facing lawsuits and demise the company tries to cover up and eradicate it's mistakes by assassinating some of it's test subjects via it's head of security, a man named Cole, who is having second thoughts about his role in life and his position at the company.

This is a standard zombie movie; no better and no worse than many such movies. So there is nothing new or different here except the zombies are athletic. Watching these zombies, it occurred to me that it is probably possible to have a life with the old-style, lumbering, leg-dragging zombies since anyone (with the exception of the very young, the disabled, and the stupid) could avoid them. I mean you'd peek out your window to see if any of them were about, and if not, you'd grab your briefcase, your bag, your books, whatever, and run off to your job, to school, or wherever. It would be a bit of a nuisance but doable. But with these new-age zombies, forget about it! You'd be shut down completely. They're fast, ferocious, and agile.

This is not the first time I've seen this type of quick-moving zombies in movies. Probably not the first time for you either. They seem to be evolving, or have evolved. So I'm thinking: Suppose there was a way to herd them on to a track and have them race? It would be something.

Boloxxxi's Zombie Race Dream

---Commentator 1: "Aaand theeey're offf!"

---Commentator 2: "What a ragged bunch! Some with no shoes, and some with only one."

---Commentator 3: "Looks like FaceEater is making an early bid. He's pulled ahead more than two lengths."

---Commentator 1: "But SkullBreaker is closing in fast. He wants that human carrot on the bike up ahead."

---Commentator 2: "That would be pretty blond cheerleader Wendy NiceSet. She's been riding motorcycles with her four brothers since she was yeah high."

---Commentator 3: "Hot on the heels of SkullBreaker is BoneChomper and BrainSlurper. -And not to be outdone, coming up right behind those two with their vicious blood-curdling looks, is NeckGouger, SpleenTaker, and BackBreaker."

---Commentator 1: "And last but not least, appropriately bringing up the rear, is AssKisser. What a race folks!!!"

Love, Boloxxxi.