''Devil's Playground'' is a British

horror film Horror is a film genre that seeks to elicit fear or disgust in its audience for entertainment purposes. Horror films often explore dark subject matter and may deal with transgressive topics or themes. Broad elements include monsters, apoca ...

directed by Mark McQueen and starring

Craig Fairbrass Craig John Fairbrass (born 15 January 1964) is an English actor, producer, and screenwriter. He is best known for his roles as Delmar in the thriller film ''Cliffhanger'' (1993), Dan Sullivan in the BBC soap opera ''EastEnders'' (1999–2001), ...

. Intandem Films has the worldwide rights to the film, which was produced by Freddie Hutton-Mills,

Bart Ruspoli Bartolomeo Sebastian "Bart" Ruspoli (born 8 November 1976 in London) is an Italian and English actor. Career Bart Ruspoli trained at the Webber Douglas Academy of Dramatic Art, where he graduated in 1998. He is also the writer and Producer of ...

and Jonathan Sothcott.

Plot

After the final stage of human testing goes horribly awry, the test subjects of the fictional pharmaceutical company N-Gen become violently ill. As the side effects worsen, the test subjects become increasingly violent until they are little but marauding beasts. Worse yet, their bites are infectious and in short order London is overrun with hordes of bloodthirsty monsters. Cole, a mercenary for N-Gen and a hardened killer, is searching for Angela Mills, the only hope of a cure for this plague which threatens the globe. As the only test subject who did not suffer side effects, her immunity holds the key to preventing a worldwide apocalypse. Cole's mission is complicated by chaos, continual attacks by the infected, and the virus slowly overtaking his own body.

Cast

Production

Shooting began on 30 November 2009 at

Elstree Studios Elstree Studios is a generic term which can refer to several current and demolished British film studios and television studios based in or around the town of Borehamwood and village of Elstree in Hertfordshire, England. Production studios ha ...

Release

''Devil's Playground'' premiered at the Gorezone Film Festival on 3 October 2010. Vivendi released it on DVD and video on demand on 11 October 2011.

Reception

Leslie Felperin of ''

Variety Variety may refer to: Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats * Variety (radio) * Variety show, in theater and television Films * ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont * ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...

'' called it "unoriginal but watchable". Mark L. Miller of

AICN Ain't It Cool News (AICN) is an entertainment news website founded by Harry Knowles and run by his sister Dannie Knowles since September 2017, dedicated to news, rumors, and reviews of upcoming and current films, television, and comic book proj ...

wrote that it is "heavy on action and surprisingly textured when it comes to story." William Bibbiani of

Crave Online Mandatory (formerly CraveOnline Media) is a lifestyle website based in Los Angeles with sales offices in New York City, Chicago and San Francisco. The site is owned by media company Evolve Media, LLC. Mandatory focuses its contents into the male- ...

called it a forgettable and "completely nondescript" knock-off of ''

28 Days Later ''28 Days Later'' is a 2002 British post-apocalyptic horror film directed by Danny Boyle and written by Alex Garland. It stars Cillian Murphy as a bicycle courier who awakens from a coma to discover the accidental release of a highly contagi ...

''. Kayley Viteo criticised the rapid shifts in tone and called it a caricature of ''28 Days Later''.

Peter Dendle Peter Dendle is a professor of English at Penn State Mont Alto, teaching classes on folklore, 20th and 21st century representations of the Middle Ages, Old and Middle English (language and literature), and the monstrous (in film, folklore, and s ...

wrote that the film is "largely familiar, but the execution is competent and convincing".

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Devil's Playground 2010 films 2010 horror films 2010s monster movies British zombie films Films shot at Elstree Film Studios Films set in London 2010s English-language films 2010s British films