Release Date: 9/9/2011
From acclaimed director Steven Soderbergh (Traffic), Contagion is a sprawling medical thriller that follows the rapid progress of a lethal airborne virus that kills its victims in a matter of days. As the fast moving pandemic grows, the worldwide medical community races to find a cure and control the panic that spreads through the public faster than the virus itself. In the midst of the chaos, ordinary people struggle to survive in a society ripping at the seams.
The film opens with Soderbergh’s own style of extreme close-ups on a bowl of peanuts, a drinking glass, a bus handrail, or a doorknob, all play nicely as he germophobically focuses on nearly every possible point of contact that are unknowingly infected. Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow), mother and wife returns home from a business trip in China. She begins to showing symptoms of a flu-like illness which unfortunately her son contracts. Beth becomes so ill that her husband Mitch (Matt Damon) rushes her to the hospital where she eventually succumbs to her ailment and becomes the first known victim of a disease that will take out a large portion of the world’s population.
Dr. Ellis Cheever (Laurence Fishburne), one of the top doctors for the Center for Disease Control, sends Dr. Erin Mears (Kate Winslet), a disease containment expert, into the field to try contain the virus’s outbreak. At the same time, the World Health Organization sends Dr. Leonora Orantes (Marion Cotillard) into China to help determine the Index Patient and the origin of the disease. Sadly though, her character is set adrift about an hour through the film and we don’t see or hear about her until the film draws to a close. The film’s wildcard is Alan Krumweide (Jude Law), a maniacal San Francisco web blogger who runs an alarmist website. Krumweide seeks fame and fortune as he exploits the disease.
Contagion takes place in several countries around the world, and follows multiple plot lines that are related but not necessarily interconnected. Because the film has so many great characters and so many great talents, you would think that it would contain at least a few great performances. It is true, Contagion has a great cast. To say anything else would be an understatement. If each actor in the film demanded their normal going rate, Contagion would be the most expensive film ever made. Matt Damon alone makes a minimum $10-15 million per film. So when a cast like this comes together, its usually for one of two reasons: either they’ve each connected with the script or source material in some profound way, or they’re all chomping at the bit to work with the film’s director. In this case, the latter is true. Steven Soderbergh is a great filmmaker; nothing short of a genius when he sits in the director’s chair. And with so many A-list stars signing on for this project, you would not only expect at least one great performance, but you expect the picture itself to be something of an achievement. We barely get below one or two layers of any of the film’s characters.
Screenwriter Scott Z. Burns (The Bourne Ultimatum) shows a great deal of attention detail with his script that is no doubt thanks to a ton of research. Because of this, the film plays less like Outbreak and more like a med-school reading at Stanford. It can be a bit wordy when it comes to the scientific analysis of the disease, and what the characters are saying isn’t always explained. There is a lot of talk about the disease, dubbed MEV-1 and it’s incubation period, fomite – the transmission from surface-to-surface, so on and so forth. So unless you are an actual doctor of medicine, you may get a little….lost.
Although the acting was good overall, there just wasn’t enough character development for the audience to get really involved. Aside from Matt Damon and Kate Winslet, the performances are a bit flat. Laurence Fishburne is probably has the film’s most stalwart character and even him we barely feel for. As an everyman, Matt Damon is extremely engaging and Kate Winlset is just a freak in terms of her acting talent. The film does have an actual hero, though you have to sift through a few layers of A-list actors who – for the most part – all play characters thinner than lunchmeat. As Dr. Ally Hextall, a doctor at the CDC assigned the job of finding a vaccine, Jennifer Ehle adds a subtle touch to a huge cast.
Contagion is certainly one of the most realistic film portraying a global pandemic, but that doesn’t make it any good or even very interesting. The lone terrifying scene involves Matt Damon and his daughter as they scour the streets among savage looters and gas siphoners; truly and genuinely frightening. For the most part, despite its unique and infectious style, Contagion lacks any real substance and isn’t as potent as one would hope.
IMDb: 7.7/10
Rottentomatoes: 82%
Movie Wiseguys: 6.5/10