A group of US film lovers have started dressing up as disgraced entertainer Jimmy Savile after the release of the film 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple – leaving Brits baffled
Brits have been left baffled over a number of American moviegoers spotted dressed as Jimmy Savile ahead of the release of the film 28 Years Later: The Bone Temple, the latest film in the 28 Days Later franchise, which was released this month.
While disgraced Savile wouldn’t be someone people in the UK would choose to take style inspiration from, it appears American’s don’t realise who he actually is.
The film follows a murderous cult known as “the Jimmies” and stalk the ruins of post‑apocalyptic Britain. The gang is led by Sir Jimmy Crystal, played by Jack O’Connell, and they are all instantly recognisable for their cheap tracksuits, bleached blonde wigs and particular mannerisms – mimicking Jimmy Savile’s style.
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The film’s producer, Danny Boyle, and O’Connell have been clear that Sir Jimmy Crystal was designed as a “Savile-inspired figure” and the character “draws on Savile’s entire pop-cultural footprint”.
UK viewers can see that Crystal is unmistakably similar to Savile, whose decades-long history of sexual abuse was only revealed after his death.
The disgraced entertainer exploited his fame and access to positions of trust to abuse hundreds of people, most of them children, over more than 50 years. His crimes took place backstage at television shows such as Top of the Pops but also in hospitals, children’s homes and institutions in which he had cultivated influence and free rein.
The film is set in 2002 when Britain collapses, and this is before Savile’s crimes were unearthed. It’s not clear when the characters in Bone Temple would have encountered him, given that the peak of his fame predated their fictional lives.
But the gang idolise the entertainer not because he is sinister but because the world never knew the truth, and in this story, never would. The irony, of course, is that the audience do, which is why the imagery is meant to unsettle, not inspire fancy dress.
But this irony has been lost on some US and Canadian fans, with clips, photos, and even dedicated fan accounts of the Jimmies are circulating on social media, showing viewers turning up to screenings dressed as the “Jimmy Gang”, wearing tracksuits, gold chains, cigars, and the signature white bob, unaware of the real-life Savile scandal that inspired the characters.
Brits have been left horrified at the glamourisation of the characters, and have been quick to criticise the outfits, hoping that they realise who he was soon. But many US fans argue that Savile was never a household name in their country and that his infamy simply hasn’t reached across the pond.
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