Film Review - CONTAGION (2011) Screenplay by Scott Z. Burns Directed by Steven Soderbergh
Yes, it was a generation ago when the film industry was all a-buzz about the forthcoming non-fiction bio-thriller The Hot Zone, Richard Preston's best-selling cautionary tale of the dangers of pandemic-causing viruses like Ebola and Hanta. A bidding war ensued, competing projects were announced, and the Spring of 1995 saw Warner Brothers' glossy thriller Outbreak, with a tony cast including Dustin Hoffman and Morgan Freeman. Pulpy and over-the-top, it provoked true unease only during a sequence where a cough in a movie theater disseminates the virus among the audience; when a flesh-and-blood patron coughed, my crowd broke into nervous laughter.
What a difference a generation makes. Now the same studio gives us Contagion, as serious and solemn a film as could be made on the subject. Unlike earlier disease-run-amok entries like The Andromeda Strain, there are no chromium-plated laboratories constructed in desert enclaves, no no leaps of technological faith. This is plausibility of the present moment. The film is committed, often bracingly so, to presenting the spread of a heretofore unseen pathogen in detail that is both panoramic and intimate in scope. I give away nothing when I say that, no, the disease is not contained before it exacts a horrific toll on humanity, and accolades and Oscars will not save every member of this star-studded cast.
Even before the lights rise on Scene One, we are put ill at ease by the sound of a cough and the unsettling typeface that tells us we have already jumped to Day Two. Gwyneth Paltrow is on her cellphone, post-assignation, and looking more than a bit peaked. (The entire movie appears shot through a thin veil of mucous.) Through a rapid sequence of cuts, we are shown the exponential spread of the virus, and how within days it is infecting Hong Kong, London and, for those of us nationalists, Minneapolis and Chicago. Paltrow's husband Matt Damon is a widower before the first reel ends, and that's not the extent of the damage done his family. The MEV-1 virus is a terrible swift sword, and screenwriter Burns (The Bourne Ultimatum) is also interested in the machinations that occur on the political, corporate and social network levels. It does not take long for Uncle Sam to discover that there are few protocols that are effective when the greatest enemy we face are the relationships that bring us together - along with our unfortunate tendency to touch our faces 3-5 times per hour.
That's what makes Contagion an odd endeavor, and ultimately one that's less than fulfilling. For all its attention to scientific jargon and intrigue, director Soderbergh struggles with the relationships that not only must power the plot but engage the emotions. There is much to accomplish here, and the film clips along briskly - perhaps too briskly - in an effort to mirror the spread of the disease. Jude Law is a blogger who stumbles upon footage of one of the first victims, and may or may not have found the cure in nature (think Laetrile). From his initial YouTube-spread home trial, we cut to a mob vandalizing a pharmacy unable to keep the substance in stock. The rhythm throws us off balance, and we struggle to connect to characters that are there to advance the thesis. When the film permits the audience a scene of emotion, it's as though it reminded itself that, yes, this is still about the human race and we wouldn't be in this mess if we didn't like to cuddle.
Considered as a pseudo-documentary, Contagion has greater impact. Many of the cast members have seldom appeared this fragile, even puffy, onscreen. Damon has taken on the additional heft of a guy who loves his Vikings and his bratwurst, and Kate Winslet is thoroughly de-glammed as a CDC employee assigned to keep a lid on a situation that has spun out of control before it has been recognized. And underneath my viewing of the movie, there is this amazement that it could be released on the same weekend as the decade anniversary of the inciting incident for years of national fear. How far we have come from the days when the Twin Towers needed to be digitally erased from Zoolander lest the audience be reminded of what it could never possibly forget. For such an abjectly grim look at global catastrophe, Contagion saves its most fearsome moment for the very end. It's the shoe-dropping Day One; the casual prelude to cataclysm has a more shattering impact than the scenes that precede it. Perhaps it's finally time to move beyond 9/11 fear. But then again, they never really did establish who mailed that anthrax in 2001, did they?
Great Comic Book Covers - THE TWILIGHT ZONE #35 (December 1970) Artist Unknown
By 1970 the entire world knew writer Rod Serling through his accomplished teleplays for such landmark dramas as Patterns, The Comedian and Requiem for a Heavyweight. But it was his five years as artistic powerhouse behind the incomparable Twilight Zone that affixed him permanently in the cultural zeitgeist. As the success of this Independence Day's TZ marathon on SyFy can attest, he has never left. A recent tribute column by Maureen Dowd went so far as to include this epitaph: "Everything is Rod Serling now." Television's original Angry Young Man was a man ahead of his time.
But in 1970 I did not know this. Due to the vicissitudes of syndication, I never saw an episode of Twilight Zone until I was into my college years. But it was my favorite television series, despite never having watched a single installment. I devoured the paperback books that adapted Serling's teleplays into prose (even the Bantam anthologies that were "edited" by Serling, Devils and Demons and Rod Serling's Triple W - Witches, Warlocks and Werewolves), and did the same for the Night Gallery volumes when released. No, my exposure to one Rodman Serling came as the man who introduced stories for Gold Key's Twilight Zone comic book. Gold Key made their mark on the industry by licensing virtually every TV property they could get their hands upon, and in addition to publishing a handful of originals like Doctor Solar and Turok: Son of Stone, they also brought young readers new tales from series like The Man from UNCLE, Dark Shadows and Star Trek.
Twilight Zone was an anthology comic, one of dozens that filled the newsstands in the 1970s, and I have to admit; reading the tales now, the writers at Gold Key (including such comic luminaries as Marv Wolfman, Len Wein and Arnold Drake) did an excellent job of nailing Serling's approach to the series. These were not standard "spook stories," but were mostly set in contemporary settings and dealt with workaday folks who somehow slipped between the cracks in reality. In one noteworthy tale, "Fortune and Men's Eyes," they blatantly cribbed from Serling's Night Gallery teleplay "Eyes," replacing Joan Crawford's imperious dowager with a male character who meets a similar fate. And check that title! "Fortune..." was lifted from a Shakespeare sonnet, but also inspired by a then-controversial 1967 Broadway show about homosexuality. Oh, what they got away with back then...
But what drew readers to Gold Key titles were the rich, lustrous painted covers by such artists as George Wilson and Morris Gollub. (GK did such a poor job of record-keeping that proper credits are missing for most of what they published.) They had the appearance of paperback books of the era, and made me feel very adult when I slapped down my 15 cents for an issue. Check out the composition on this stunner. It was a common approach to have a large figure that was symbolically dominating a smaller figure, not necessarily a literal depiction of a moment in a story from the issue. Gold Key meant for their books to stand out on the newsstand, and they did.
One more element to the story of this cover: In 2004, just after I had finshed a move down to Chicago, I happened to be browsing through eBay auctions, and lo and behold, the original art for this cover was up for bids, with a starting price of $900. That would not have been a deterrent at any other point in my life, but having just relocated, money was tight, and the artwork slipped away from me. I still sentimentally covet one of these Gold Key covers, but this striking chess-themed beauty went to another (hopefully appreciative) owner. File it under "M" for "missed opportunity" - in the Twilight Zone.
If you grew up during the early 70s, that whispered query can still raise gooseflesh, and much of the reason it can is that it was voiced by the talented young actor Chris Udvarnoky. Together with his twin brother Marty, they took on the roles of Niles and Holland Perry, brothers who were joined at the soul but separated by the grave, brought to life in Thomas Tryon's novel The Other and brought to the screen by director Richard Mulligan in a deceptively pastoral 1972 film. If you think that horror can only take place within the dark of night, this atmospheric and unsettling work will prove you wrong, its Andrew Wyeth color palette stands in stark contrast to the evil and dread that eventually consume the Perry family. And the answer to the above question requires the strongest of hearts to absorb. It haunts.
And perhaps the role haunted Udvarnoky as well, as The Other was his solitary film credit. The history of cinema is lousy with precocious, over-coached performances from child actors, their parts sounding jarringly adult because no one working on the film had the slightest idea of how kids really talk. But Udvarnoky's Niles feels genuinely ten years of age, able to whip up mischief in a moment's notice, while also possessed of a developing ethos that makes him feel guilt and shame. But after all, it's not Niles who is responsible -- it's Holland, right? Holland, who no longer walks the earth, but rather occupies six feet of it. It's a difficult part to pull off, and Udvarnoky is unforgettable. (He was also fortunate enough to have a frequent screen partner in the tremendous Uta Hagen, and the consummate acting teacher certainly must have offered him some pointers. However, it's a double-edged sword; he subsequently has to act opposite her, but instead of being intimidated, he enters into the spirit of every scene with the commitment and focus that only a child can know while playing "pretend.")
Word comes today that Chris Udvarnoky passed away in New Jersey on Monday of this week at the age of only 49. He had achieved success as an x-ray technician and an EMT. His were hands that saved lives, and while we might wonder what other accomplishments we were denied in cinema, there are surely others who owe their time upon earth to his ministrations. Reference to his appearance in The Other was missing from his official obituary, but in an eerie coincidence, it aired in the wee hours of this very morning on TCM. I'd like to take that as confirmation that somewhere his soul is soaring, like on the wings of a great black bird.
Somewhere, I hope Niles Perry is once again playing The Game.
See in the sky the eagle soaring Hear how the German Shepherd bays Smell when the bull responds to nature Out in the fields where cattle graze Now is the time I long to join the chase Now is the time I leave without a trace The human race
Soon I’m gonna change And you’ll see it Soon I’m gonna change Be prepared Soon I’m gonna change And become something new
Soon I’m gonna change Think and be it Soon I’m gonna change Don’t be scared Soon I’m gonna change Wish you could do it too
I’ll have four limbs like a dog Perhaps four claws like a cat Or grow a snout like a hog Oh, please don’t run away
After I have changed Then I’ll need you After I have changed Need you so
After I have changed That is when I dare suppose You’ll stay with me And hold on to my clothes
I may be big as a horse I may be small as a mouse Whatever I am, of course. I won’t decide to stay
For when I’m changing back Back to human When I’m changing back In my nude
When again I’m me Naked as any jay . Well, that’s the time you’ll see my art After all the years of practice, boy, I’m smart Carefully I turn and hide my private part Away
This one was just ever so much fun. More stanzas could follow. Please imagine extended dance breaks...
(Sung to the tune of "America")
REGAN Why did you call in an exorcist? I’ll have a ball with your exorcist Give it your all, Mr. Exorcist Back in the hall you go, exorcist
KARRAS Get thee behind me you Satan REGAN I hope you do not mind waitin’ MERRIN God’s holy power compels you REGAN I wouldn’t buy what He sells you
Think you can bring in an exorcist Look how I’m flingin’ your exorcist Your ears are ringin’ now, exorcist You like my singin’ now, exorcist?
KARRAS She’s just a child, have pity REGAN Go back to Vatican City MERRIN You will be gone by the morrow REGAN Why am I sounding like Charo?
You can’t defeat me, you exorcist Never will beat me, you exorcist Step up and greet me, you exorcist Then you can eat me, you exorcist
MERRIN Don’t give up, we may be winning REGAN Wait til my head begins spinning KARRAS God’s will is sure to take over REGAN I’ll give this room a makeover
Stop bible-quoting now, exorcist Satan is gloating now, exorcist It is worth noting now, exorcist That I am floating now, exorcist
Your fortitude is appalling MERRIN Feel how the temperature’s falling? REGAN Soon you’ll be meeting your sure doom KARRAS Who put this statue in her room?
REGAN You cannot win, Mr. Exorcist Save your own skin, Mr. Exorcist Once I am in, Mr. Exorcist Leave her to sin, Mr. Exorcist
I was hesitant to put this one up for a number of reasons. I'm definitely taking a tongue-in-cheek approach to these parodies, but the self-sacrifice of Godric has been one of the emotional highlights of the series for me, and I didn't want to diminish its impact with snark. On a certain level, the song that the moment brings to mind is perfect as is, requiring little adaptation or revision. Also, you can find bigger fans of ALW out there than me, and I just couldn't keep those bridges from feeling clunky, but then I figured - hey, the original bridges are clunky (singing the words "gutters, mutters"? Not pretty). So while this might smack of something that a 13-year old would write in her school notebook, I still submit the following...
(Sung to the tune of "Memory")
Daylight See the dawn of a new hour As the nighttime is fading Shadows wither away Like a sunflower I yearn to turn my face to the dawn I am waiting for the day…
Midnight Now my source of resentment I am weary with memory Sick of standing alone At each twilight The human souls collect at my feet And the wind begins to moan
Memory Once I stood in the sunlight I can smile at the old days It was beautiful then I remember the time I knew what happiness was Let the memory live again
Every moment Seems replete with fatalistic warning Vampires warring And the world ignoring And soon there will be mourning
Daylight Now I wait for the sunrise I must hope for a new life Find my strength from within When the dawn comes My life will be a memory too And a new day will begin
May my sacrifice preclude The battle that’s a-borning When humans die, another life takes over Now let that day be dawning
Touch me Eric, you must believe me You alone hold the memory And know what should be done Now release me It’s time I knew what happiness is
(Sung to the tune of "Better Far to Live and Die")
Oh, better far to be undead Than to live a human life instead My stately home, my glorious manse With a staff that caters me at a glance Werewolves see to my every need They love me when it’s time to bleed I hardly lack for nary a thing As Mississippi’s Vampire King
For I am a Vampire King And it is, it is a bloody good thing To be a Vampire King (2x)
Three thousand years above the ground Have made me the canniest king around For who could ever want to know The Vampire King of Idaho I seek a Queen to share the throne (But I fill that requirement on my own) For Talbot is as a wife to me When my scepter calls for TLC
For I am a Vampire King And it is, it is a jolly gay thing To be a Vampire King (2x)
You see, it’s incomparably great To reign o’er this Magnolia State And according to this plan of mine I’ll soon own the rest of the forty-nine When Wall Street is the last to fall (That shouldn’t take much effort at all) Then all will shout, “Hurrah! Hurray! The Vampire King of the USA!”
For I am a Vampire King And it is, it is a powerful thing To be a Vampire King (2x)
Film Review - CONTAGION (2011)
laboratories constructed in desert enclaves, no no leaps of technological faith. This is plausibility of the present moment. The film is committed, often bracingly so, to presenting the spread of a heretofore unseen pathogen in detail that is both panoramic and intimate in scope. I give away nothing when I say that, no, the disease is not contained before it exacts a horrific toll on humanity, and accolades and Oscars will not save every member of this star-studded cast.
That's what makes Contagion an odd endeavor, and ultimately one that's less than fulfilling. For all its attention to scientific jargon and intrigue, director Soderbergh struggles with the relationships that not only must power the plot but engage the emotions. There is much to accomplish here, and the film clips along briskly - perhaps too briskly - in an effort to mirror the spread of the disease. Jude Law is a blogger who stumbles upon footage of one of the first victims, and may or may not have found the cure in nature (think Laetrile). From his initial YouTube-spread home trial, we cut to a mob vandalizing a pharmacy unable to keep the substance in stock. The rhythm throws us off balance, and we struggle to connect to characters that are there to advance the thesis. When the film permits the audience a scene of emotion, it's as though it reminded itself that, yes, this is still about the human race and we wouldn't be in this mess if we didn't like to cuddle.
