Written by Pete Falconer.
These processes could have easily been a major focus for the movie. A different director, like Darren Aronofsky, with his interest in isolating and amplifying individual physical details, could have built the whole film around them. There is certainly great potential in the kind of material that Contagion deals in for creating tension and suspense through heightened germ-phobic paranoia. However, as I noted in my short review, Steven Soderbergh takes a different approach. In the café scene, the sudden emphasis on the different ways that the virus could pass from person to person is carefully framed in relation Dr. Sussman’s personal point of view. His reaction shots provide the context for the scene, inflecting it with the limitations and preoccupations of an individual perspective. This perspective is situated among the many others that we see throughout the movie - Dr. Sussman is a fairly prominent character, but not one that we spend a large amount of time with. Our relationship with the doctor, as established by the film, is never close enough for his point of view to seem especially privileged or sympathetic. Other characters seem to respect him enough for us to probably accept his status as an expert, but his reaction in the café seems more visceral than scientific, as suggested by the pace of the editing and particularly by the way that Elliott Gould screws up his face in disgust. We are not led to believe that Dr. Sussman’s fears are anything but legitimate, but we are definitely encouraged to observe his reaction, rather than to share it.
That we are given even a fleeting view through the eyes of two sick characters is a clear indication of the film’s commitment to showing us more than any individual within it could possibly see. This is taken to its logical conclusion at the end of the film, where we are shown precisely how the virus jumped from species to species - from bats to pigs, and then finally human beings - in the first place. This is not something that anyone within the world of the film would ever be able to find out.
This has particularly interesting consequences in relation to Alan Krumwiede (Jude Law). We see Krumwiede claim that a homeopathic remedy, derived from the shrub forsythia, is effective against the epidemic. We see him apparently recover from the disease after taking this remedy. However, it becomes clear by the end of the movie that Krumwiede was never infected with the virus and was championing a quack cure in order to make money by manipulating investments. Krumwiede seems brash and annoying from the outset, and the claims he makes seem dubious, but the extent of his deception is only gradually revealed. This helps to temper the sense of superiority that the film’s detached perspective could potentially be seen to promote. We cannot immediately put Krumwiede into the category of “villain”, nor can we so easily label the people he deceives - who we see trampling over one another in a pharmacy where supplies of forsythia are running low - as gullible dupes. The presentation of the Krumwiede strand to the story is consistent with the general attitude that the film encourages us to adopt. We are asked to examine and compare the different reactions and perspectives that are presented to us. For this to happen, we cannot be given the opportunity to endorse or dismiss what we see straight away.
The detached, analytical style that we see in Contagion allows the movie to bring out a number of the complexities within its subject matter. Of course, this approach is unlikely to endear the film to everyone. Indeed, it would be possible to argue (with some justification) that a movie concerned with human tragedy on such a large scale would benefit from a more compassionate perspective. Such a perspective, however, would probably necessitate the loss of many of this film’s best features - its breadth, its restraint and its meticulous construction. This Alternate Take was published on November 16, 2011. Post your views Article comments powered by Disqus |
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