The Agency's Posts

Review: WikiLeaks duo's relationship powers up 'The Fifth Estate': In its own Hollywood way,"The Fifth Estate"is quite an ambitious film. It wants....
Read More>

How to maintain healthy hair through the decades: Just like skin, hair changes as we age. Here are a few tips to keep locks at their lushest for....
Read More>

Meg Ryan is set to star in a new NBC comedy: It's been nearly 30 years since Meg Ryan had her own show on the small screen. But now she's
Read More>

Captain Phillips movie review: Tom Hankss superb performance anchors thrilling tale: Those readers who habitually skip past the review to see how many stars a movie has earned....
Read More>

Why box-office surprises are becoming more common: Predicting a weekend movie ticket-grossing champ is harder than ever as pre-release audience....
Read More>

Sandra Bullock's 'Gravity': How apt is the 'Avatar' comparison?: As "Gravity"made waves at the box office this weekend,pundits both professional and....
Read More>

No Trends For Old Men: Dan Peres is the editor in chief ofDetailsmagazine Let me start by saying that I am decidedly....
Read More>

Stability, a Real Suburban Curve Ball: ‘Eastbound & Down’ Is Back for a Fourth Season Last week, on the season....
Read More>

'Gravity': Sandra Bullock space saga attracts stellar reviews: Film critics are over the moon for "Gravity," director Alfonso Cuarón's....
Read More>

Rebel Wilson: Can 'Super Fun Night' make her a TV star?: She stole scenes in "Bridesmaids" and"Pitch Perfect,"but now Rebel Wilson....
Read More>

Tom Clancy dies: Ben Affleck says writer made realism 'top priority': As the Oscar-winning filmmaker behind"Argo,"Ben Affleckcertainly knows the difference....
Read More>

'Homeland' returns strong, powered by Claire Danes: The walking wound that isClaire Danes' bipolar superspy Carrie Mathison returned to duty in....
Read More>
The Directors: Steven Soderbergh, 'Contagion'
Posted on: 09/05/11
Share/Save/Bookmark

The award winner works with screenwriter Scott Z. Burns to get at the heart of how people rise to the challenge of a world in peril.

 

Before you see a single frame in "Contagion" you listen to acough, and by the time the movie is just a few minutes oldGwyneth Paltrow's Beth Emhoff — the character heard hacking off-screen — suffers a fatal seizure (relax, it's in the trailer).

MEV-1, the fictional virus with the starring role in directorSteven Soderbergh and screenwriter Scott Z. Burns' pandemic thriller, is nearly as deadly as 1918's Spanish flu (an estimated 50 million killed worldwide), but the filmmakers are less interested in mass graves than epidemiological war rooms. "Oh, my God. Should I call someone?" a coroner asks when he examines Emhoff's brain. Replies his colleague: "Call everyone."

Constructed much like Soderbergh's "Traffic" — overlapping, international narratives linked to the central plot — "Contagion," which opens Sept. 9, has far more in common with Albert Camus' "The Plague" than "I Am Legend" or "Outbreak": How does civilization react — for better and worse — to a global health crisis? "A lot of really dangerous human behavior," Burns said, "comes out of fear."

Suddenly widowed, Mitch Emhoff (Matt Damon) tries to protect his daughter as the virus races from Hong Kong to Chicago, Minneapolis, London and Tokyo, triggering quarantines, quack cures and panic. While the mutating virus marches forward in time, "Contagion's" epidemiologists and molecular biologists struggle to rewind the clock; only in discovering how and where MEV-1 originated and spread can it be understood and controlled.

The film's heroes are the doctors and the agencies charged with preventing a real-life replica. At the World Health Organization, Dr. Leonora Orantes (Marion Cotillard) tries to trace the virus back to Patient Zero. Inside the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Dr. Ellis Cheever (Laurence Fishburne) and Dr. Erin Mears (Kate Winslet) struggle to control the virus' spread, while Dr. Ally Hextall (Jennifer Ehle), at great personal risk, searches for a vaccine. "Our exposure to the real people like this is strictly through television sound bites," Soderbergh said. "But that's the smallest and least interesting part of what they do."

Soderbergh said he was determined to avoid the usual mistakes and clichés of the genre: The science would be correct, and nameless hordes wouldn't succumb. "When you're making a movie about an issue this serious, inaccuracy and misinformation is not cool," Soderbergh said. "And the rule was we couldn't go anywhere that our characters haven't been. We can't go to Paris unless we have a character there. I don't want you to abstract the people who are dying — to cut to people you didn't know."

Burns, who researched the script with a prominent epidemiologist, said he was also interested in the potential perils of media speculation — personified by a double-dealing blogger played by Jude Law. "Unfiltered communication has the same sort of radioactive pulse in the world as a virus does," said Burns, who wrote Soderbergh's "The Informant." "How do you contain information? How do you vaccinate against misinformation when you don't have your own story to put out?"

While "Contagion" certainly doesn't minimize the mortality of its pandemic, it's ultimately a hopeful tale of how people facing extreme peril rise to the challenge. But the filmmakers admit that they now look behind them when they hear someone cough. "It made me nervous," Soderbergh said of making "Contagion." "Like Dr. Cheever says in the movie, 'We're due.'"

john.horn@latimes.com



COMMENTS
Be the first to post a comment!


Post A Comment:




  • It's 2020! Start booking roles in commercials, fashion, films, theater and more with The Agency Online!

  • NEW WORKSHOP with Barbara Barna & Sean De Simone!

    Hi Everyone and Happy Summer! Sean at Sean De Simone casting and Barbara Barna are teaming up for a super informative and fun Hosting for Home Shopping workshop. A great opportunity for established or experienced TV Hosts and Experts interested in learning how to get noticed and how to get in....
  • MASTERCLASS W. Robin Carus & David John Madore

    A Special Offer for the Agency Community, from one of our favorite NYC Casting Directors! EMAIL FacetheMusicWithUs@gmail.com Or Eventbrite To Sign Up! Class Size is Limited.
  • Don't Fall Into The Comparison Trap

    Hi Everyone! As the second installment in an ongoing series of features by the Agency's amazing community, here's some sage advice from our own Regina Rockensies; a humble (& awesome)veteran we've had the pleasure of working with for a long time. Have an excellent week! : ) - The Agency....
  • One Model's Agreement

    Hi Everyone! As the first piece in an ongoing series of original articles by the Agency community, here's a short reflection on some of the values of professional acting & modeling that we can all keep in mind for our next casting. Good luck on your castings &shoots this week! : ) -....




 
home       castings&news       privacy policy       terms and conditions      contact us      browser tips
Official PayPal Seal