In one of the most memorably sublime scenes of Danny Boyle’s zombie masterpiece, 28 Days Later (2002), a nonplussed Jim (played by a young Cillian Murphy) wanders the deserted streets of London in scavenged hospital scrubs, having just awoken from a coma. Extreme long shots of Jim on an empty Westminster Bridge, in front of the Household Cavalry Museum, walking past St. Paul’s Cathedral, and alongside the Royal Exchange reveal the sobering extent of his isolation. Like him, we are learning that life has all but stopped in one of the busiest, most populated cities in the world, and, as far as we can tell, Jim may be the only person left alive, a realization that provokes dread for whatever caused society to fall into such a desolate state.

Images from this scene are not unlike what people around the world are experiencing today as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Previously bustling sites of activity have been transformed into urban wastelands, as recent photographs have shown. In one collection posted by CNN, a Jerusalem train station sits empty, Roman ruins in Italy stand quietly in the absence of tourists, and a lone individual walks the darkened halls of a Beijing shopping mall past dozens of shuttered storefronts. Whereas in 28 Days Later this lack of human activity is the result of an apocalyptic loss of life due to the “rage” virus, the non-diegetic global stasis we are experiencing is the result of mass social distancing and quarantine efforts to halt the spread of COVID-19. Read more