What Makes Danny Boyle Danny Boyle

Danny Boyle’s works, as a whole, sort of buck the tradition of embracing one common theme. Boyle loves to explore the human condition and different sides of human morality. His films can range from showcasing the absolute worst actions humans are capable (28 Days Later, Trainspotting) to showing the audience that, above all, hope prevails, or some other cloyingly sweet message (Slumdog Millionaire, Millions). His films have very little in common with each other, as he leaps from zombie film (28 Days Later) to children’s fantasy (Millions) to intelligent science-fiction (Sunshine) to adults’ fantasy (Slumdog Millionaire), all in the space of six years. His style varies from film to film, with 28 Days Later adopting a gritty, realistic style, Millions looking like a straightforward children’s film except for the few moments where it slips into fantasy, Sunshine aping classic science fiction films such as 2001: A Space Odyssey and Alien in its set design and visual style before it descends into an overly artistic horror film in its final act, and Slumdog Millionaire doing interesting things with story structure and injecting insane amounts of energy into several sequences to cover up the fact that the film’s story is overwhelmingly shallow. (207)