Big Screen Blurb: Contagion

What Jaws did for swimming at the beach, Contagion was supposed to do for the handshake. Did it? Not so much. What you do get is an all-star director (Steven Soderbergh), cast and an interesting but complex plot, which is both a positive and a neggy.

Our story starts with Beth (Gwyneth Paltrow). She's back from a routine trip to the orient, that ends with a nasty twist. Beth is sick. Jet lag is the suspected culprit, but alas, it's far more than adjusting to time zones. She's picked up a virus that is quite literally a killer. Before settling in at home in Minneapolis, however, Beth has managed to leave a little piece of herself--that is, the virus, in Hong Kong and Chicago. With plenty of healthy hosts for the virus to latch onto, it spreads quickly. Just as quickly the Center for Disease Control is trying to get a handle on it. The key word here is 'trying'. They are trying to identify the virus and develop a cure, all while trying to keep the severity of the disease to a hush in order to prevent widespread chaos and panic. Yadayadayada the virus spreads as the true nature of humanity rears its ugly head on the way to an eventual cure.

I'll go with 2.5 Stars on this one. As mentioned previously, there is both good and bad in Contagion. The positive comes from watching greats like Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne and Kate Winslet strut their stuff. The negatives comes from a simple lack of development. The massive plot structure never really allows for a good sense of character development or thorough development of each point within the plot. Subsequently, time after time, you merely touch on a this character and their situation. Examples abound. At one point, one official is kidnapped and held in exchange for doses of the cure. That situation disappears for 30-minutes before we return to see our hapless victim happily tutoring the village kids. Now, I'm not one to encourage long stories, but repeatedly, we seemed to have left out the story. For instance, as news of the virus emerges, we go from a level of 'slight concern' over the strand to 'total anarchy' without ever really seeing the panic build.

It was a great concept with a potentially great story and a tremendous cast, that was just executed in a very choppy manner. Give me fewer characters and develop them within that great concept. Let me live each step through their eyes so I can feel the situation build into a panic that showcases the good and bad of humanity. Ultimately, it really didn't accomplish that for me. Actually, I wasn't even compelled to pick up an extra can of Lysol, much less stray from a good handshake.

Considering the combination of buzz that I had heard from friends and a great cast, I really had high expectations. However, this would have been a much better rental for me; and that's what I'm recommending on this one. No need to go big here. Add Contagion to to your queue and plug it into your Blu-Ray in January when it's released for the small screen.

True...OUT!