AVOID this "movie"... The makers did a lot of work to give their endeavor a boost in rating. At the time writing this review 57% of all voters rated it a 10... 248 fake accounts!? I am a big fan of walker/zombie flicks and I watched a lot. Darkest Day belongs to the worst kind: amateur-cinematography, "actors" who can't act at all. No budget. No story. I guess even no script. No nothing... If u want to waste money and/or lifetime this movie is for you. If you don't want to get ripped off just skip this piece. It's even hard to fill the 10 lines demanded for reviews cuz this movie doesn't deserve that amount of work.
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Tweetienator13 August 2016
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Theo Robertson9 June 2015Oh a zombie apocalypse ! Just what the world needs - not . You can understand why they're popular with low to no budget film makers because all it needs to take one is a small handful of extras , a quiet morning to film on some deserted streets and you've got a movie , one that you've probably seen a dozen times and were probably bored by the second , third or fourth time
So what's so different about this one ? you may ask and in reply all I can say is not much at all . If you've seen Boyle and Garland's 28 DAYS / WEEKS LATER there's very little new here . In fact the story starts with a young man waking up on a beach and the entire early segment is structured exactly like the beginning of Boyle's film on a mis en scene level except it's set in Brighton instead of London . Even the music is similar to 28DL . The only time the film goes its own way is in an inferior manner where the uninfected do illogical things like have a house party ! I know Brighton has a reputation for hedonism but this is too much on a credibility level . It also copies the illogical plot turns of 28 DL where a wimpish middle class student is able to kill battle hardened squaddies with his bare hands . I know Britain's military reputation has plummeted after Iraq and Afghanistan but you'd think a soldier would get the better of a student once in a while
Searching on the internet I found out DARKEST DAY cost less than £1,000 to make , was shot over a long period of time . In other words it's a labour of love Unfortunately as an audience member I am under no obligation to love any film . It might have worked better if it had a bigger budget , a more developed screenplay and a better cast but you could say that about most films that aren't Hollywood blockbusters -
JDtheBigGuy7 June 2015One of the worse films I have seen in a long time. It was so bad that I just couldn't watch it through to the end.
At best the actors were mediocre and mostly well below average but the script certainly didn't help them.
The filming appeared like it was done on a home video camera and there were constant out of focus errors. If the shaky camera was on purpose they massively overused it. It also looked like the camera man/woman didn't know how to work the camera and was having a fit the whole time they filmed.
The rip off of every idea from 28 days later was obvious. I have seen better produced, filmed and acted home movies. -
kjjames8114 August 2016I try not to write a negative review but this time i feel that i must. Where and how this film got over 5 in a review it must be the people that made it have done the voting. One of, no scratch that the worst film i have watched in such a long time that i felt the need to write a review. Firstly it looks as if it was made by some university students who had to make a film for their drama class, the acting was bad, the story was okay, the filming itself, half shaky cam was totally off putting. Let's just say that i am glad i didn't pay to watch this film, if i had bought it or rented it i would have been really cheesed off but as it was free, i still felt robbed and wanted a refund. Don't waste your time on this film.
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neil-2935323 June 2015Never has a film inspired me so much to come on-line and write a review. An absolute garbage film
Not sure if this is a spoiler alert but trust me nothing could spoil this film - just in case... spoiler alert!!!
Clearly a rip off from 28 days later but thats OK... The zombie genre is saturated now and its hard to be original - I'm actually OK with a little plagerism and remakes but people puuulease
The script was appalling. The acting even worse. None of the characters were any way likable...in fact I was rooting for the Zombies. After 5 mins...and had I been the lead character would have gladly gone back out onto the street to meet my demise rather than spend a minute with these other "characters". Seriously bad acting... like jaw droppingly "are these people getting paid for this bad!"
Look I could go on and on because it was so poor. I can't honestly believe it made it into a DVD and the filmmakers were actually happy to release this abomination. Did they not watch it back?
All I want to do is for those who are going to the DVD shop and see the cover "British Horror at its best"... warn you - put it back on the shelf and run away. Time would be better spent cutting your hair with a cheese grator than watching this garbage
I rarely turn off a film but after an hour - an hour of my life wasted - I turned it off and aghast at really how bad this could be.
Don't watch it - you have been warned! -
digger018 June 2015I just don't know where to start with this... The script is terrible the acting is worse and the cameraman must have been drunk, half the shots are out of focus, I think they were looking for a shaky camera effect to cover the bad acting but all it did was make me dizzy. To say the acting was bad would be an insult to the term 'poor', the lead Dan played by Dan Rickard, kinda held it together but only just however they didn't receive any help from the script. In essence, this is nothing more than a zombie based movie poorly executed, its been done over so many times to the point where its boring. Personally I think if a classroom of 6th graders, armed only with their cell phone's could've achieved a more realistic production.
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I picked up a copy of "Darkest Day" given the movie's cover was fairly interesting and depicted zombies. Yeah, a zombie movie, and I am all in.
However, it turned out that "Darkest Day" was a mere cash-in and a copy of the 2002 "28 Days Later" movie, and it was not a particularly good imitation. And it was painstakingly clear that writers Will Martin and Dan Rickard had borrowed heavily from writer Alex Garland and director Danny Boyle's 2002 movie. Tch. Tch.
And this is not a traditional zombie movie, so if you like me sit down to watch "Darkest Day" hoping it is a proper zombie movie, you will be sorely disappointed. First of all, it is mere infected humans with rage, yeah surprise, where did we see this before? Infected humans running around all fast and agile jumping and violently assaulting uninfected with fists and teeth.
The acting in "Darkest Day" was adequate for the type of movie that it was, which is not a major Hollywood blockbuster with so many millions in its budget that it could have supported a small country for years to come.
As for the storyline, well it was just too mundane and offered nothing much of any interest to the audience, and that was essentially the coup de grace to the movie, ending its misery and sending it far beyond mediocrity.
And the characters in the movie were very flaccid, one-dimensional and essentially merged with one and each other to the point where you didn't have any interest in them or a lack of care when they were infected or killed. And the actors were struggling with bringing their characters to life on the screen because everything was stacked against them in terms of proper characters.
I endured "Darkest Day" to the very end, an ordeal in itself, and one that I can't really recommend that you embark upon. This addition to the zombie movie came and went without as much as a groan, shamble or an infectious bite. -
This is a blow by blow review though the first hour is basically the silliest 'fast zombie' movie I've ever seen. The protagonist, who is barely 20 and has a weak, slender build later manages to overpower a soldier armed with an l86(a2?), that's right, he manages to push the barrel up, disarm the soldier (who I'd assume is spec ops and would instantly go for his sidearm or knife), wrestle him to the floor (despite being about half his weight) then strangle him to death then strangle him to death, then runs off ignoring the fact that there's a rifle and lying on the floor right beside him. To summarise the first hour of the movie, this boy (and I mean it when I say it) wakes up on a beach with amnesia (overused) and runs after two people, he shouts for them to wait and despite the infected only really screaming comically running in this the guy out of the two attacks him anyway and then subsequently gets killed. He and the girlfriend? Of dead guy run back to a house filled with hipsters and one self proclaimed hard lad who won't shut up about his biceps. Eventually his (sister? seriously none of this is telegraphed at all to the audience, you're left to assume and hope you're right) somehow (maybe I'll find out in the last half hour of this movie) gets infected and after being taped up, then freed by her brother? Runs around the house trying to kill everyone until they throw her out a window. Now the option of leaving the city and going out to a house in the country (rather than sitting drinking beer until you pass out while playing nice loud music in the middle of a zombie infested city, throwing food at each other and generally getting on like zombie food rather than 'survivors') was on the table in the first 20 minutes but "it's a bit of a hike" despite the roads being filled with cars the only time they leave the house is when they're starving, to go to a supermarket half a mile away when there are houses all around for looting, even when the protagonist takes a rucksack of food off a random dead girl he's scolded with "don't do that, it isn't right" well gee, not like it's zombie apocalypse. It's also worth mentioning that the cameraman is terrible and doesn't seem to understand depth of field, for example; when two people are talking one will be in focus and the other will be horribly blurry. Maybe they wanted this 'unique art- style' but you use depth of field to isolate a character or characters, when there's a dialogue of two people, both should be in focus. So, the hipster squad; chased by a wholly inept military who decide to use a sonic device to lure the zombies out to chase the hipster team down (yet don't seem to use any military tactics like staggered reloads so everyone ends up out of ammo at the same time) or on their fallback position they hadn't rigged any clay more (this whole spelling correction thing drives me crazy when using actual words!) mines prior so naturally the soldier's 'cunning plan' (reminds me of the 'cunning plans' in Blackadder) completely backfires and most, if not all of them get eaten, when they could have just fallen back and flipped a switch. They have Chinooks, they have some expensive sonic zombie horde truck but not basic training or tactics; it's like they were made stupid on purpose, which is probably the case because they're outsmarted by 19-25 year old's at every corner, none with any sort of survival training. Even when the hipster squad decides to light a fire and stay outside for the night all of them go to sleep instead of setting watch schedules. Personally they'd be dead 10 times over if they weren't so amazingly 'lucky'. As well as that, even though the military have choppers, amazing sonic technology zombie horde trucks; they don't seem to have any sort of IR camera (which you can buy as an add-on for your phone for gods sake!) as you could pick up a group of hikers and differentiate from zombies on high res IR rather easy.
Yet another one of the hipster squad has died, from a half amputated hand; something that bears mentioning is that the hipster squad don't know how the virus spreads and seem to be immune so at worst this one guy would lose his hand, not his life. It just seems like the developers are throwing twists in to 'make it interesting', sadly this isn't working, it just makes the film seem sillier and sillier as I watch it. The skinny protagonist decides to split up from the hipster squad, surrenders to a soldier as he was given a prototype vaccine and may still be an infected carrier blah blah same old BS is on the ground, still manages to overpower another spec ops soldier; again ignores his rifle and then as the hipster squad magically arrive at their country house he manages to magically tel-e port (Good job spelling correct, maybe you should pick up a dictionary; both clay (no space) more and tel-e (no space, no hyphen) port will be in it, or you know; since reviews are moderated allow 'spelling mistakes' if someone check-boxes them and penalise users who abuse that system) to the beach where he started out, despite it being a two days walk. On this beach he sits down, contemplates life and then walks into the water (with no stones in his pockets) until he is completely submerged, apparently killing himself, when he could have just been shot in the head literally one and a half 'film minutes' ago. Cut to credits.
I want my hour and a half back, this film is a terrible copy of 28 days later with a bit of a twist. -
claudio_carvalho17 September 2016A young man called Dan (Dan Rickard) wakes up on a beach with amnesia. He wanders through a derelict town and stumbles upon a couple. Out of the blue, the man called Ben is murdered by a crazy man and Dan and the woman called Lisa (Christianne van Wijk) flee. She brings him to a house with survivors and he befriends the group: the leader Sam (Chris Wandell), Kate (Samantha Bolter), James (Richard Wilkinson), Stephen (Christian Wise), Will (Simon Drake), Adi (Adrienne Wandell) and Satch (Simon Bennett-Leyh). Meanwhile the army is taking over the town. Soon Adi is infected and their friends are forced to kill her. When a group goes to a supermarket to scavenge supplies, they stumble upon the army and Dan and Lisa escape together. But a sniper kills Lisa and Dan subdues and kills the soldier. He finds a wanted note with his photo in the pocket of the soldier. Why is the army hunting Dan down?
"Darkest Hour" is neither a great nor a bad zombie film as most of the reviews indicate. It is an entertaining low budget movie, with deficiencies in edition and camera work, but that can be disregarded considering it budget. The action scenes with shaking camera are annoying and unnecessary. But the story is good and the performances are not bad. My vote is five.
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dpraptor8 February 2019As everyone else said, poor everything..... I think a group of high school kids with a cell phone camera could do almost as good. But I give some credit to the actors for giving good try, guess you got to start somewhere! But watch this only if its the only thing left to watch..
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kingslandbungalow31 August 2016The poster for "Darkest Day" says it all - "British Zombie Horror at its best" - if this is a separate genre then there's no hope at all!
The movie blatantly rips-off 28 days movies - the main character awakes after an apocalypse with no memory of what has happened or how he got there. It's so blatant I can't believe the movie was green-lighted - but then again looking at the credits it seems to be a vanity/conceit piece for the main actor (who I think is the director too). This explains why the main actor is soooo wooden and the directing total crap.
Characters seem to behave in unpredictable and unlikely ways, stare at the camera, overact or underact and are essentially unbelievable.
There is an amazingly ineffective army, an amazingly over-effective character who single-handedly beats up a whole hoard of zombies, dumb characters who get over the death of their friends and family in a heartbeat, and loads of really bad special effects. A character also seems to die from a broken arm for some reason...
At the end the main character kills himself for no real reason - I only wish he'd saved us all the time and done it in the first scene of this turd of a movie. -
Pairic14 July 2019Darkest Day: A man wakes up on Brighton beach with no memory of who he is; no, its not Jason Bourne: this is a (low budget) Zombiesque movie. Zombiesque because the crazed virus victims appear to be alive but otherwise act very much like Zombies and rule over Brighton. (Could this be an allegorical allusion to the Greens?). The man teams up with some uninfected partying dudes and gals in Brighton who avoided the army evacuation after the Viral Outbreak. Soldiers are now shooting anyone they see in evacuated areas.
Worth watching, 5/10. -
parry_na13 October 2016Borrowing themes from other sources has never been a problem for me; 'Darkest Day' is clearly influenced by British 2002 zombie classic '28 Days Later'.
The first thing that struck me about this, after its fast-paced, gruesome opening, is the very flat acting on display from most of the cast. Although one gets used to the stilted delivery, it is still a stumbling block – and sadly, two of the main players Dan (Dan Rickard) and Sam (Chris Wandell) are the worst offenders. Most of the other characters are reduced to merely a few words here and there, which may or may not be a good thing. The exception is Samantha Bolter's Kate, who is excellent, believable and far more 'there' than her somewhat two-dimensional colleagues.
When researching this film online, however, many of the cast are also active behind the scenes. Richard Wilkinson (James) also composed the music, Simon Drake (Will) is a second unit director and camera operator. Most prolific is Dan Rickard, who co-wrote and directed, provided digital effects and editing (as well as providing some special effects for 'The Dead (2010)' and 'The Dead 2: India (2013)').
The story features Dan, who wakes up on Brighton beach, with no memory how he got there. He soon realises the world is awash with 'the infected' (the word 'zombie' is only used in the credits at the end), and becomes reluctantly taken in by a group of young people lead by physically intimidating Sam (nick-named 'Arnie' at one point). These people spend their days getting endlessly drunk, going on occasional shopping sprees, and only leaving their seaside-town home once the military discover their whereabouts and take more than a passing interest. A bond almost forms between rivals Sam and Dan as the latter, who realises the military are specifically looking for him (he was infected, but appears to have been cured), volunteers to lead the soldiers away from the group, resulting in a low-key but very effective ending.
Occasionally the violently shaking camera becomes a little heady, but visually, the film looks terrifically bleak, making great use of the seafront location and economically relaying how run-down the world has become, with sparing use of overturned cars, smashed windows and forlorn streets. The Infected, although little more than bloodied performers, are persuasive in their intent; shrieking and moving at speed (and there are LOADS of them) and create the most tense scenes.
Rumoured to be budgeted at £1,000, my initial misgivings about 'Darkest Day' soon became overcome with admiration that the project is as good as it is. -
PaulinhoSouza2 March 2017Do not watch! What lack of creativity! Idiot mix of a group of young alcoholics who are hiding and do not have the least consistency of having a normal life, until the arrival of a new member of the group who use the comparison only by lack of memory. The unfolding of the film saves only a beautiful attempt at a photograph of the open fields. Scenes of speed to annoy, not to mention the terrible expression of the actors. Movie of spoiled teenagers.
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Lugodoc23 August 2016Not bad for an Indie. It is set in the 28 Days Later version of Brighton and the deserted city is convincingly portrayed on a budget of about £1,000, according to the DVD extras. The army scenes are particularly well done, and I had to watch the making-of-doc in the extras to find out that the helicopter scenes were very, very good model work and CGI done by the director Dan Rickard himself. The acting is a bit ropey but I have seen far worse, especially since none of the cast are actually actors. Most of the action scenes are very well shot and edited and show that this director has talent. The early scenes in the squat reminded me of the Brighton I got to know years ago.
All of the plot lines are left unresolved, such as the giant speakers, and the ending felt like the writer just gave up like the main character did, but the film is still often gripping and worth watching to see what can be possible for a British indie these days.
Somebody should give Rickard a decent script and a budget. -
emola718 June 2015Yes it's a 28 Days Later ripoff. That being said, the low budget quality adds to the greatness of the film.
It's hard to create a decent film with no money. Darkest Day does just that.
Interesting characters, great filming locations, all for a real low budget. If it had the budget of any other Zombie film it would be as good as the best of them.
This is a must see ..especially for those who love indie films, zombie films, low budget but great films.
This may be a low budget film, but the story, filming locations, action, plot, violence ...all works. It all works well. -
This is set in Brighton where we meet Dan who has woken up on a beach. He has lost his memory and does not know that some sort of virus has infected most of the population who turn into mentals with a nasty tendency to kill humans. He meets up with some survivors but it soon becomes apparent that the Army are out to get him and will be pretty ruthless in so doing, so his new chums are hardly over impressed with him.
What unfolds takes us back to what happened to him and the journey to try to escape. Now this is an independent film but it has excellent sets, some very good acting, excellent CGI for the most part and a very believable script and a fair few extras to bulk out the plot and make it all that more enjoyable.
I was not expecting great shakes from this so was really surprised at how much I liked it. It will not be everyone's cup of tea but it can be seen as a bit of mindless fun with a hint at the ever present questions of existentialism. There are obvious comparisons to 'Twenty Eight Days Later' which I enjoyed too, but approach this with an open mind and I hope you will get as much out of this as I did. -
nogodnomasters30 November 2018A neurological virus infects humans and causes them to go into a berserk killer mode, on steroids. They are stronger and faster. Dan (Dan Rickard) wakes up on a beach, not knowing what is happening. He meets up with some people scavenging for food and joins up with the group that operates more like a frat house, than survivalists. Some welcome Dan, others are leery about him. About the only thing worse than the super charged zombies is the military with guns.
Seemed odd the first group he encountered didn't carry any sort of weapon while they were out. I couldn't imagine going anywhere without at least a bat. The frat house scenes were long and boring. In fact much of the film was tedious.
Guide: F-bomb. No sex or nudity. -
rebecca-j-wilson17 June 2021If you have watched the 28 films then don't bother you have seen most of this film already. The acting is stiff, the dialogue is short and uninteresting. The only thing that vaguely interested me what's why the army were chasing them, but your given the answer in 3 seconds of diologe and to be honest I missed it! It would be brilliant if your mate had made it on a old hand held, but is not, so... It's not. Don't be fooled though they have retitled it and re-released it as 'infected' 2021. It's still as naff.
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gpoposki26 August 2016Like i said, there is a lesson to be learned here especially for new/future film makers, and we will get to it later.
First of all, this film feels like its made by students for their final exam, as they usually rush for the cliché zombie film. But i have to admit i expected much less from this film. The acting was pretty good. There is a decent story (looking over the cliché zombie apocalypse part), and the is rather unusual (as expected from low budget films).
A big problem with this film is the fact that, the director, Dan Rickard, was doing everything acting, production and writing wise. The director should be the one who only directs, sure he could help around, but not do literally everything. In this case hes the director, writer, cinematographer, editor, special effects, visual effects and above all hes the main character.
All signs point to a person who really wanted to make a film, and get big, but not have enough experience. Although he is a pretty good writer.
I will be honest though, i have almost made the exact same mistake of rushing a film, good thing i saw my error before it got out of hand.
All in all, if you're a new/future film maker, than id recommend watching this film so you can learn what mistakes not to make in the future. But if you're just looking for a film to watch i would not recommend watching this. -
worldof208021 January 2013This film is quite an achievement is one very important respect. It hangs together well as a feature length movie - not bad for an amateur, zero-budget production. The story flows, the locations are good. Set pieces work by and large. Very impressive and quite enjoyable. On the downside, it is entirely bereft of any original ideas, being basically a rehash of the 28 franchise, right down to using precisely the same motifs and tropes we all know (and love?) This does not bode well for the film-maker. He needs to find his own groove if he is to have future success. Take some chances, dude.
The major flaw is the director's casting of himself in the lead role. The lead is bland, passive, has bad posture and is largely silent. He also has the haircut of a 6 year old boy. One can't help but be baffled by the attractive women falling for his 'charms' and the possibility of, for instance, him charging an armed soldier and strangling him to death, which seems ludicrously implausible. It would have been far better to sit back and let an actor with lead looks and lead charisma take the role. This vanity is compounded when our gallant lead makes the ultimate sacrifice at the end in order to save humanity. Sort of like Jesus.
Wandell and Bolter stand out as the two most convincing characters. Pretty good acting from both rescues the film much of the time. Wandell has a great time with his role and his character is the most rounded. I'm not sure whether he got lucky here, the part being written with a bit more depth that the others, or whether he took his material and ran with it. Bolter's character isn't as rich but she does as good a job as she can with what she has. We might see them again, and no bad thing.
As is often the case with amateur productions there's a tendency to be self-indulgent with editing. The film could lose 20 minutes and be better for it. There's quite a lot of pensive looks into the middle distance towards the end of the film that got me yawning. It might have been better to have got in an editor who wasn't in the film as such people tend to be happier about slicing away at excess material. Always remember, don't hesitate to kill your babies! The editing is good otherwise, as I didn't really notice it - the ultimate sign of good editing.
Overall, well worth a watch. I would advise the director to take more chances and forget a career in acting (at least as a lead). Amazing that he could pull all this together though, so keep up the perspiration and increase the inspiration. But lose the haircut ;-) -
thomasthewolfe2 October 2018I was being a snob tonight about the zombie movie I wanted to watch and spent an hour trying to find one that would not disappoint me. I have seen a lot of zombie movies....its actually the only kind of movie I go out of my way to watch, so the wikipedia zombie film list is really picked over. I happened upon another "complete list of zombie movies" and stumbled across this. The reviews were good, and out of the three I had narrowed down, the reviews are why I decided to watch it.
I was expecting low budget but it was not that at all. I was expecting a bad story and unlikable characters but I was wrong on that too. It has its flaws and if you go looking to criticize then you will be able to create a list, for sure, but despite some things that could be better (graphics, some acting, questionable scenarios) it was enjoyable and kept me wanting to watch it.
I left 9/10 because 10/10 was too much and with a 9 I was attempting to raise its rating (doing my part to do that) because I think its worth more stars than it has. British zombie movies are consistently good too and if thats something you like then this is one to check out for sure. -
gusvy24 October 2016I love Samantha Bolter! She works so well in these kind of movies. I watched this movie because she was in it, but the movie was actually not bad at all! If you like zombie movies and Samantha Bolter, you need to check out this movie for sure. I make sure to try and watch every zombie film that I can, but this is a definite eye-catcher! There were some scenes that I thought were a bit amateur, but overall a good and fun movie to watch and you can't forget Samantha Bolter!! By looking at how this movie was made, there wasn't much money put into it. I would have to say that this movie had a lot of production value concerning everything else. This was a very great considering the director is an amateur. I hope that Dan Rickard continues to grow in his path to success in directing. I give this movie a 9 considering the circumstances and how well it was made. If you like these kind of movies, I'd recommend you to check it out!
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fionascott-4610729 May 2016I have to say I really enjoyed this film. It was clearly made on minimal money and, after watching the making of, I was really impressed by how the filmmakers managed to get it done.
The film itself has it's flaws and it's a shame they didn't come up with characters that were more likable but I love zombie films and this definitely quenched my zombie thirst! Visually I thought the film got better in the second half and that's where the pace picked up too. Ignore negative comments, I would say this film is definitely worth a watch to see what can be achieved with little or no cash (particularly if you are a newbie filmmaker). -
masters_tiger14 May 2017Blatant rip off of a much better film, 28 Days later. Only without the the creative subplots. All this film does is make me happy that I live in America, where we have guns, reloading equipment and redneck doomsday preppers on our side. And Im not complaining because I'm an entitled American, y'all can obviously make good zombie movies set in the UK, 28 days later, 28 weeks later and Doomsday come to mind. This one wasn't one of them. None of the characters were especially likable. I often found myself rooting for the zombies or the Army. Nothing to see here folks, move along.