Contagion (2011)

After spending a few hours at the skating rink for Genesis’ birthday party, (I cannot believe she is 14), it was time to kick back and enjoy some decent virus based entertainment. While zombies are always fun, the tragedy and devastation of a real outbreak may be scarier (especially considering this is the year 2012), fortunately, that is exactly what the 2011 thriller Contagion may deliver.

Plot/ A thriller centered on the threat posed by a deadly disease and an international team of doctors contracted by the CDC to deal with the outbreak.

When I saw the preview for this, I wanted to see it. With the way the media covers outbreaks such as H1N1 or SARS, I felt it was a great time for Hollywood to capitalize on the mass hysteria involved. To me, this one did not disappoint. The cast was solid and their performances were all good. Unfortunately, by boasting such a dynamic cast, the character development did suffer some with all of the divergent storylines formulated to take advantage of the cast, but that flaw was not a showstopper. Surrounding this cast, the storyline was tremendous, perfectly centering the main character of this movie The Virus itself. The scenery and cinematography was awesome, and overall this is a well-put together docudrama. It does have some flaws besides the character development as the pacing was a bit slow and there was a lot of story that went unresolved.  In the end, this was much more a docudrama than thriller and should be viewed with that in mind, but it is an effective venture into the mind of an epidemic that would ravage the world. Check it out!