Doomsday Comes to the UK

The sci-fi/horror flick Doomsday, which was released in the U.S. earlier this year, has arrived in the U.K., where it is causing something of a stir thanks to where it takes place.

The film is set in a futuristic Britain, where Scotland has been walled off from the rest of the country in order to contain a 28-Days-Later-esque virus. Reduced to a cannibalistic wasteland, Scotland must be infiltrated by heroic Englishmen (and women) in order to find a cure for a new outbreak.

There are those who feel the movie is slanderous of Scotland and of the image of it held by many in the rest of Great Britain. Said Scottish National Party MP Angus MacNeil in an article in The Guardian:

I think it is a subliminal thought they have in England: in the dark recesses of their minds they believe that if Scotland is ever separated from London, then we will be cut off from the rest of the world for good. They think we'll build our own Hadrian's Wall and keep everyone out - which is of course nonsense. At 80p a brick, it will simply be too expensive.

Gotta love those Scotsmen and their senses of humor. However, there are more pragmatic views involved here, as well. Tourism organizations like Visit Scotland are hoping the movie will drum up interest in their ancient land. And Scottish Screen, a company that contributed significant funding to the picture and helped scout locations, believes a picture like Doomsday will have long-term benefits for the region's own motion picture industry:

Doomsday brought significant benefits to Scotland, not least to Scotland's talented base of cast and crew who worked on the production. It's likely to also attract a big audience who will see the extent to which Scotland can provide a flexible and diverse backdrop to all genres of film.