Contagion | B-

Living in the Livingston Quads was like living in a cesspool of bacterial nastiness; everyday, one ran the risk of encountering a strange substance on the shower walls that could give an unwitting victim any manner of infectious, potentially flesh-eating diseases. For reasons such as this, University students may find Steven Soderbergh's Contagion particularly disturbing.

After returning to her Minneapolis home from a business trip overseas, Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow, Iron Man 2) exhibits a minor sniffle that eventually evolves into a virulent disease that kills her within two days. Though Beth and her son are the first to succumb to the contagion, her husband, Mitch (Matt Damon, The Adjustment Bureau) exhibits an immunity doctors are left completely befuddled by, as this seemingly isolated contagion spreads into a global pandemic. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Deputy Director Ellis Cheever (Lawrence Fishburne, The Matrix) attempts to strike a balance between investigating the disease-related deaths and avoiding widespread public contamination, which, of course, happens anyway. Cheever assigns Dr. Erin Mears (Kate Winslet, Revolutionary Road) to trace the source of the virus.

Contagion is Soderbergh's attempt to recreate the type of star-studded disaster films from the 1970s. Immediately coming to mind are films such as The Poseidon Adventure and The Towering Inferno. Like these films, Contagion has a talented cast. Alongside Paltrow, Damon, Winslet and Fishburne are Jude Law (Sherlock Holmes) and Marion Cotillard (Midnight in Paris). Soderbergh is clearly no stranger to working with star-packed casts, as he demonstrated in the Ocean's Eleven series of films, and the acting is as high quality as to be expected.

The film is, above all else, chilling. While not intended to be a horror movie, Contagion proves that quiet and subtle themes can be much more terrifying than a hack-and-slash film. It constantly instills viewers with a germophobic paranoia that even the slightest touch could eventually result in death. But, despite the quality of the acting and a mood that is genuinely unsettling, the film comes across as mechanical and predictable. The millions of deaths, political infighting and public rioting are all disaster movie staples. Even a little bit of emotion by Matt Damon can't inject Contagion with enough personality to make it feel unique. Parallels to biological warfare and the avian flu scare of several years ago are also inevitable and predictable.

Contagion is a film that plays on a realistic fear. It succeeds in making viewers think about their habits. Yet while Purell may enjoy heightened sales, Contagion lacks the personality to make it memorable.