Contagion
They don't make movies like this anymore.
And by that, I mean 'good disaster movies.'
Although not technically a disaster movie, it has that same kind of ensemble cast film where the characters are simply ciphers for the frenetically mounting plot. The characters don't know each other, don't directly interact with each other and their actions are all, either intentionally or unintentionally, smaller components of a greater whole. The only thing they all have in common is that they're all fighting the virus, which is really the star/main character of the movie. I kind of appreciated this aspect of the film, as it showed how a problem like this might be solved. There are no big moments where all the characters are sitting in the same room while one man tells them all how they're going to 'beat this thing.' Nobody's pointing fingers, getting angry, making wild faces and doing ridiculous things. I imagine that, for the most part, the screenplay's focus was on trying to get us to believe in the scenario. When your main character is a faceless infection, there is intense pressure on you as a writer to give it a voice through the ensemble cast's words and, more importantly, their actions. I'd say Soderbergh pulled it off very well.
This is not a movie about bombast. As I've stated, the characters do not have their big action moment. The WHO, the CDC, the Chinese and US governments and even independent studies groups and internet bloggers all play roles in the spreading and controlling of the virus and the mass panic that ensues as a result. All the bureaucracy, politics, logistics, science and greed accompanying such an event are played out with exactly the right amount of screen time and summary in order for you to understand that this thing is spreading and time is moving too fast for people to adequately deal with it.
It's an interesting irony in the film, then, that forces collude against the virus from all corners and walks of life. As the movie progresses, you eventually learn, in an omniscient POV which the characters aren't privy to, how the whole thing started. It's no one specific thing and it's no bioweapon (thank heaven for that.) It's a freak of fate, a bizarre confluence of circumstances from several tangentially related events, that kicks it off. By the same token, it's a bunch of human beings, similarly tangentially related by their unified cause and nothing else, that all add to the mix to ultimately defeat the killer monster.
And while the movie wastes no time on character exposition-there is no wasted space here and no long, drawn out or contrived scenes of characters going into painful length about their motivations-they come off as more realistic sympathetic than anybody in your standard summer action film. The Lawrence Fishburn character, a man of conscience, does something at one point in the movie that is a contributing factor to the social instability in the midwest during the film's second act. The movie doesn't waste time with ten minutes psychoanalyzing him-it just expects us to believe he's a three dimensional character because it isn't a self conscious narrative, desperate for our approval and adoration. It expects us to believe it's innocent until proven guilty, and in my opinion it never lets us down in that respect. It is just a great example of omniscient POV. It gives us exactly what we need because we can't be everywhere at once.
As a director, Soderbergh can be proud. This movie is compelling and provocative but it still manages to communicate its message effectively and without complication. Today's audience might find it a bit off putting that certain characters die so suddenly or that there are no big 'hero' moments. But that is the stuff of less talented storytellers. Let lesser directors put casts more talented than they deserve through the ridiculous theatrics of outrunning the end of the world on cars and planes. I won't say Contagion is a PERFECT movie, but it's better than most of its competition.
4 out of 5 stars
