Contagion
Directed: Steven Soderberg
Starring: Matt Damon, Kate Winslet,
Marion Cotillard, Laurence Fishburne, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Jennifer Ehle,
Elliot Gould
Genre: Drama, Sci-Fi, Thriller
Stars: 4.8/5
(Spoilers!)
I remember when this film was first
released, I was desperate to see it in the cinema, and however I never did. It
somehow got lost in my mind over the years between all the new releases
probably.
I noticed how many big names that were in the film from first reading about it –
and from most of my experience of films, that’s usually when it’s a pretty
decent film to watch!
I
couldn’t wait to start this film as I knew I’d enjoy it, and I knew that I
would end up doing a review on it. It’s completely my type of movie, I like suspense
and the wondering of what happens and I find that I can easily put myself in
others shoes so with this film, I felt comfortable. It captured my attention
from the first words spoken, not because I’ve been desperate to see it, but because it
was so interesting! There was always something happening and so much
information gathering to be done! There simply wasn’t time to be bored, well,
for me that is.
The
film starts with a woman named Beth (Gwyneth Paltrow) who has been away on a
business trip (also had sex with her Ex) comes home feeling ill with a
mysterious illness which she thinks is the flu. She passed the illness onto her
son when she hugged him, after returning home and he then catches the illness too. Beth
dies after a seizure in front of her husband and son. Whilst her husband Mitch (Matt
Damon) is at the hospital with her, trying to come to terms with her sudden
death, their son dies that same afternoon. The doctors are baffled with this
mysterious illness.
We
then see a variety of people fall down with the same symptoms and also die.
Beth’s Ex also falls down with the same illness, which also results in his
death. The doctors offer Mitch the chance to have his wife examined through an
autopsy to see if they could explain the sudden death – We see the doctors
being shocked through the examination whilst looking at her brain, ordering a
team member to contact “everyone”.
They
take Mitch into quarantine due to worry that he may have the disease and could
possibly pass it onto others. We find out that he is somehow immune to the
virus.
The
film is very good at this point as I got drawn into the symptoms of the illness
and I wanted to know more. The film does have a touch of the “Fringe” and “CSI”
feel to it, and personally is a massive fan of both tv shows. I also wanted to
know the seriousness of the illness, how many people would be affected and if
they’d be able to stop it.
Through
the most part of the film we saw many doctors try and determined what the disease was. The biggest part was trying to determine the source of the outbreak, and
how to defeat it by finding a cure.
It
all felt very realistic and how you’d imagine the Health services would deal with
this type of situation. It was consistent all through the film which was great
for keeping you interested, it was the perfect pace.
Dr.
Erin Mears (Kate Winslet) was brought in to determine how deadly the disease is
going to be on the population and by every means find an antidote, by Dr. Ellis
Cheever. (Laurence Fishburne) She gives a briefing of her knowledge; that the
disease was contagious through touch and that they need to work out the rate of
people that are carriers and the numbers of who can potentially get infected.
The numbers keep rising through the film.
Allan
(Jude Law) a blogger journalist comes in contact with the story and has his own
conspiracies about the disease and lets everyone knows about them. He believes
the government is keeping hold of the cure to make a profit out of the tragedy.
In
the background there is doctors working on the cure and testing on live
cultures to see if they can make a vaccine. Dr. Sussman (Elliot Gould) makes a
stable version of the cultures, which means they can start doing trials for the
vaccine. The government says that it could be months before the vaccine could
be ready. They call the disease MEV-1.
Meanwhile
there are doctors working on the source of the outbreak and find footing of the
whereabouts of Beth. We see her in a casino with various people playing at a
table. She blows on someone’s chip for luck. We start to understand how the
disease spread from Beth throughout the casino and they link to the handful of
people that died in the beginning of the film. We see Allan infected with the
disease, as he blogs live from his computer and see that he is taking
medication called “Forsyitha” and tells the audience that if he is still alive
in the morning then, the medication works.
Dr.
Erin falls ill with the disease and contacts Dr. Cheever that she has it. He
feels responsible for Erin falling ill as he
sent her to find out about it, he then proceeds to call his wife and tell her
to come to where he is. Aubrey (Cheevers’ Wife) leaves the county and goes
shopping for supplies, to be contacted by a friend asking why she’s late for
dinner – only to tell the true reason behind her sudden departure.
Allens’
blog becomes a sensation and everyone is desperate to get hold of the
medication. We see the world turn into a frenzy and start looting and rioting,
the streets become empty. Everyday lives have stopped as people are scared and
stay inside, hiding from the disease.
The
animal trials are under going but nothing has succeeded, until monkey #57 is
successful. There is finally a cure and is currently being produced and is
announced that it shall be ready in roughly 90 days. The death toll is
currently at a 26 million figure.
It
was a relief when they found a cure as we see that the world is in a panic, and
just knowing that it could happen to us at any point. The film was done really
well and made you think about the important things in life, knowing that people
get ill and die every day, obviously the scale was much bigger, but that’s what
makes it such a gripping film. It had the "end of the world" feeling.
Allen
tells his viewers not to take the medication and someone tells him out to the
police and gets arrested. It gets found out that he never had the virus and
made it up to get noticed. He has persuaded all his followers against taking
the vaccine which could save their lives. He was going to be charged with fraud
only to get released on bail, due to the response of his viewers.
Dr. Cheevers get told there's going to be a investigation into the leaking of a message from inside the offices. He told his wife what really happened, and her friend leaked it out, which started the panic.
Meanwhile, as there isn’t enough of the cure made up to heal everyone, there is
a lottery of dates where the people in which the birthdays have fallen on the
ball, can have the vaccination.
From that moment on, we see everything slowly go back to normal. The death rates
have slowed down (obviously people died of other things than the disease) and
the world gets back to the state where it once was. Allen continues blogging
about his conspiracies on the government, which we know have no ground after
his lie on the medication and having the illness in the first place.
We
then find out the source of the disease which happens to be Beths' company does
a construction where some trees are getting cut down, which makes bats fly from
their home, the infected bat bites a banana, flies over to a farmers hut where
he drops a piece of the banana skin, which a pig eats, the pig gets killed and
taken to the restaurant at the casino where the chef touches the pig with bare
hands. He then has the disease on his hands and poses in a picture with Beth,
then transferring the disease onto her.
I
really enjoyed the loop up at the end, it made it clear where it started and it
made sense for us. It did make me wonder where the bat got the disease from though.
There’s always a place. I loved everything about this film, the pace, storyline
and characters, but mainly the tension that was felt during the film. It was
very well played by all the actors and actresses, they made us think and
connect to them.
It’s
a film I’d definitely watch again, and I think also with the ending, you’d see
more about it and understand maybe the language in which they spoke “professionally”
as doctors to one another. It was a fantastic film and has become one of my
favourites! I highly recommend it!
I also went to see 'The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time' @ #Gielgud Theatre, London, with captions too. It was so cleverly written and I enjoyed every minute. The stage, the actors and the technical props, just bang on. The only slight thing I might comment on was that there was a lot of talking, which I knew from reading the book and the fact the main character is autistic, and was to be expected but wow, there was a lot to read! The other awesome thing is that the theatre sent me a synopsis before the show which was a really great idea to help anticipate what would be happening next and therefore be prepared for some of the dialogue. It can often feel like a lot to take in at once, to be reading, watching the show and following it entirely, so having that synopsis fresh in my mind, was really helpful.
