''Battle of the Bone'' is a 2008 Northern Irish

independent Independent or Independents may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups * Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s * Independ ...

zombie film A zombie film is a film genre. Zombies are fictional creatures usually portrayed as reanimated corpses or virally infected human beings. They are commonly portrayed as cannibalistic in nature. While zombie films generally fall into the horror g ...

written and directed by

George Clarke George Clarke (7 May 1661 – 22 October 1736), of All Souls, Oxford, was an English architect, print collector and Tory politician who sat in the English and British House of Commons between 1702 and 1736. Life The son of Sir William Clarke ...

, and is claimed as

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is variously described as a country, province or region. Nort ...

's "first ever"

kung-fu Chinese martial arts, often called by the umbrella terms kung fu (; ), kuoshu () or wushu (), are multiple fighting styles that have developed over the centuries in Greater China. These fighting styles are often classified according to common ...

zombie movie.

Plot

As rival mobs battle it out on the streets of

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

, three friends are caught in the middle and have to contend not only with the rioters but a horde of marauding

zombies A zombie (Haitian French: , ht, zonbi) is a mythological undead corporeal revenant created through the reanimation of a corpse. Zombies are most commonly found in horror and fantasy genre works. The term comes from Haitian folklore, in whic ...

Partial cast

Production

Both the film's title and its plot timeline being set on 12 July, stem from King William III's 12 July 1690 Battle of the Boyne. Created on a budget of £10,000, the filmmaker chose

The Troubles The Troubles ( ga, Na Trioblóidí) were an ethno-nationalist conflict in Northern Ireland that lasted about 30 years from the late 1960s to 1998. Also known internationally as the Northern Ireland conflict, it is sometimes described as an "i ...

as the film's inspiration and stated that he saw the movie as a means to address the issue of division with a twist that shows the two sides of the Belfast community joining to deal with a common threat. Filming took place in Belfast, Ireland at locations such as the Downshire psychiatric hospital. Per the ''

Irish Times ''The Irish Times'' is an Irish daily broadsheet newspaper and online digital publication. It launched on 29 March 1859. The editor is Ruadhán Mac Cormaic. It is published every day except Sundays. ''The Irish Times'' is considered a newspaper ...

'', the movie was "one of the biggest low-budget features to have been made in the city" and employed over 500 extras. Clarke and crew utilized various means to keep the film under budget, such as using a wheelchair as a makeshift dolly-rig and a cherry picker for aerial shots.

Release

The film first screened in

, on 17 July 2008, and was followed by a DVD release on 23 October 2008.

Reception

Peter Dendle covered the film in the second volume of ''The Zombie Movie Encyclopedia,'' noting that it was "too low budget to come across to most general audiences as much more than friends having fun around some local buildings and streets, but George Clarke's impassioned zombie pic gained immediate attention both for some vivaciously choreographed action sequences and for its political overtones." The director later noted that the film did not go over well with mainstream critics but that it appealed to the genre fans that viewed it.

Awards

* Audience Choice Award at the Freak Show Horror Film Festival (2008, won)

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Battle Of The Bone 2008 films Northern Irish films Films set in Belfast 2008 horror films Martial arts horror films British horror films British independent films British zombie films 2008 independent films Films shot in Belfast 2000s English-language films 2000s British films