Like many others this weekend, I watched Steven Soderbergh’s epidemic disaster movie Contagion. Unlike many other viewers I suspect, I came away feeling surprisingly optimistic. Not about the threat of a devastating pandemic, but over Soderbergh’s informed and plausible treatment of the subject, and the eventual triumph of humanity over adversity.
Contagion topped the US movie charts this weekend, bringing in an estimated $23 million. But it also garnered a lot of attention as a uniquely science and practice-grounded movie. Articles from Wired, The Atlantic and io9 amongst others highlight the technical expertise and realism underpinning the movie, making it something of an anomaly in Hollywood’s books.
I remember being told when I joined the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in 2000 that Outbreak (the 1995 thriller based around an epidemic with Dustin Hoffman and Rene Russo) was “their movie” – even though the science was given Hollywood’s super-sized treatment. Then there was the 1997 movie Contact with Jodi Foster, based on a Carl Sagan novel. Long heralded as one of the most accurate depictions of scientists to come out of Hollywood, it too sacrifices reality and consistency on the alter of edge-of-your-seat story telling.
Contagion is different. For a start, leading experts were brought in to the process early on. UM School of Public Health alumnus Larry Brilliant was involved at an early stage, and introduced screenwriter Scott Z. Burns to Ian Lipkin – Professor of Epidemiology and Professor of Neurology and Pathology at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University. Ian and his team went on to become technical consultants to the movie, ensuring a high level of realism was achieved. As he wrote in yesterday’s New York Times,
I ADMIT I was wary when I was approached, late in 2008, about working on a movie with the director Steven Soderbergh about a flulike pandemic… Then I discovered that Mr. Soderbergh and the screenwriter on the project, Scott Z. Burns, agreed with me. They were determined to make a movie — “Contagion,” which opened this weekend — that didn’t distort reality but did convey the risks that we all face from emerging infectious diseases.
The result is a movie that oozes credibility when it comes to portraying the responses of public health experts to a lethal and readily transmitted virus.
This in itself is highly notable. Rather than be subsumed by the Hollywood mantra “never let the facts get in the way of a good story”, Soderbergh instead allows the facts to make a good story better. And in doing so, he eloquently emphasizes the power of evidence-based and socially responsive decisions in the face of human health challenges, as well as the expertise, professionalism and humanity of public health professionals.
But laudable as this focus on detail is in the movie, what really grabbed my attention was the way in which the epidemic scenario played out.
We’ve all seen them – movies where disaster leads to a dystopian future, or where a miraculous last minute intervention saves the day. Both extremes lead to nail biting narratives – neither are plausible. In contrast, it was the very plausibility of Contagion which made it stand out for me. Not everyone is exposed to the virus. Not everyone who is exposed died. Power, water and food remain available. Civil provisions are made to keep the virus contained and society functioning. And at the end of the day, a vaccine is developed and distributed. People die, but humanity recovers.
The very plausibility of the scenario that unfolds makes it more disturbing in some ways – as we watch bodies being dropped into mass graves and social order begin to erode, it’s hard not to consider seriously the likelihood of something similar happening. Yet this is a scenario where humanity prevails, and this is at the root of my optimism. Soderbergh has not only crafted a movie that serves to help equip us to face an uncertain future; he has crafted one that underlines the power of science and social responsibility in overcoming new risks.
I don’t know how well the movie will do in the long run. I hope it does well – it deserves to. But irrespective of its financial success, this is a movie that sets the standard for exploring plausible futures, and enabling us to imagine how we might respond as a species – and survive.
Endnote
In conjunction with the launch of Contagion, the promotion company Participant Media has put together an impressive web resource tailored to maximize the movie’s potential health education impact. Check out Lindsay Ward’s blog and links here.
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