Contagion - Steven Soderbergh

It shows how the old Red sensors performed in the wild. A lot of blown lights. Shows the importance or lack of importance of good exposure.

49640319831_a475a1d627_b.jpg


It is one movie i reference for the “video” look. Soderbeegh is kind of a cowboy, his films tend to have a rough edge to the cinematography. I remember watching two films in one day, and i had the same feeling of “who the heck would shoot this way?” And both films ended up being Soderbergh. But overall, he has a good aesthetic, and i like his films.
 
A good find, just watched and thoroughly enjoyed, but it's not for the faint of heart while in this current climate.
 
I gave this a watch again. Saw it when it first came out. The coughing at the start over black gave me instant anxiety. Eerie how close a lot of it is to today's events. They probably made the illness a little too aggressive to be plausible for such a widespread contagion. Ebola is easy to contain because it's so aggressive. It burns through people fast and makes itself known before it can be spread widely. The virus in this movie attacks with a similar speed so I don't think it would go global. Like most Soderbergh movies, it's smartly written, shot and presented with clinical efficiency, and is a little cold emotionally. The line "Blogging isn't journalism, it's graffiti with punctuation.", might be one of my all time favourite lines of dialogue.
 
The virus in the movie had a higher R0 than something like Ebola so it would spread faster, globally. It started at 2 and then was no lower than 4 at one point, and not sure it was implied any further that its reproduction was increasing.
 
I'm no scientist obviously, but I've learned so much about viruses and transmission these past few weeks something about it doesn't pass the smell test. Seems for ideal worldwide spread, you'd want something that hides out in the body for a good amount of time before attacking, like Covid-19 does. This seemed to kill you within 48 hours of infection.
 
Yeah...there's a difference between how fast a disease spreads and what it ultimately specifically does to one.

[I'm of course not a medical professional either; the following is just basic layman's information WHO and others provide to the public.]

___

In the movie (because it's a movie), it continued to become more contagious and did also appear to kill you quickly.

Based on current knowledge (at least what they know so far or think they know), they believe COVID-19 has a R-naught of 2-2.5, which would put it around the seasonal flu based on newer studies. (The flu used to be between 1.5-2.)

The movie's virus was 4 (if not more).

Something like measles could be 15+.

(These numbers may and do change over the years, and different independent studies may have them slightly lower or higher, but the same concept applies e.g. 3 or 3.2 is going to be more contagious than 1.4 or 1.6.)
 
Just seems like it was sexed up a little for the sake of entertainment, the only 'movie-ish' thing in an otherwise thoroughly plausible film.
 
While I enjoyed Contagion I think Nat Geo's dramatization of the Ebola scare in the States, inspired by true events, was an eye opener and kind of made one sit up straight. Especially for those of us who are pretty distanced and isolated from the day to day goings on that lie beneath the surface of our daily self absorbed lives. The book was far more though provoking!

Chris Young

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YxNYnHTxAg

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4131818/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

Hot Zone.jpg
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top