Review of Contagion (2011) by Sias — 29 Mar 2012

A decent attempt at making a compelling and believable epidemic movie. Acting is competent, but the story suffers from pacing issues and the odd plot hole that detracts from the drama. It's a hard, cold film that plays almost like a documentary.

Character development is scarce, which adds a sense of realism as we're not sat around hearing about how much Kate Winslet's character likes cake or hearing about Matt Damon's childhood. The film is more a recording of a series of events than a standard character driven narrative.

That won't be to everyone's taste as many expect character development to be a part of a tale. But Contagion doesn't play to that tune and instead goes for gritty realism. The film is let down by many inconsistencies in the narrative but generally succeeds in being gripping.

One very bad addition to this film is the character played by Jude Law. His persona and method of acting simply do not fit in with the tone of the movie and often his character cheapens it and feels like a tacked on plot line to try and create some backroom tension.

This film is about epidemiologists, virologists and politicians working together to tackle a deadly disease (with the odd smattering of human interest story with Wahlberg), it is not about how the government and other big pharma prevent woo-woo chinese medicine from being advertised commercially - so the addition of this plot line just feels silly and out of place.

Overall Contagion is a competent flick that many may be put off due to its inherent lack of Hollywood gloss and over characterisation, which I feel a film of this kind really needs. Did we really want another Outbreak with Dustin Hoffman?! No? I thought not.