Steven Soderbergh’s movie Contagion got a massive boost in streaming views because of the global outbreak of the coronavirus. News coverage of the deadly virus, which has already killed over 300 people, has been non-stop since China reported the first casualty of the illness to the World Health Organization on January 11, 2020. Since then, the virus has spread to more than fifteen countries, with a staggering 14,000 confirmed infections worldwide.
News of the outbreak reminds moviegoers of Contagion, a 2011 multi-narrative film starring Marion Cotillard, Bryan Cranston, Matt Damon, Jude Law, Laurence Fishburne, and Jennifer Ehle. Contagion, which has an 84% on Rotten Tomatoes, also features a memorable cameo from Gwyneth Paltrow. The film opens with Paltrow’s Beth returning from a business trip in Hong Kong, with what she thinks is a cold. The illness (later revealed to be a deadly virus) kills her two days later, shocking audiences with the star’s death minutes into the film.
The barrage of headlines about a deadly virus, spreading like wildfire across the world, pushed Contagion to the “No. 10 most sold movie on iTunes” on January 28, 2020, CinemaBlend reports. The sales spike followed a surge in Google searches for the film, no doubt prompted by the widespread coverage of coronavirus. However, the site notes that by the following day, Contagion had slipped back down to #15 on the iTunes chart. It’s possible Contagion’s bleak ending - in 26 days the movie-virus kills 26 million people worldwide - wasn’t the reassuring Hollywood ending viewers hoped to see.
Outbreaks and unstoppable super-bugs have always been a popular topic in fiction. Dustin Hoffman tried to prevent a global catastrophe in the Wolfgang Petersen-directed box-office success, Outbreak, which was itself based on author Richard Preston’s nonfiction thriller, The Hot Zone: A Terrifying True Story, a 1994 best-selling novel. There’s even a popular mobile game called Plague Inc that simulates the spread of harmful pathogens; it too saw a massive spike in players. Writers also use the threat of a deadly virus as a set up to something much worse. Marvel Comics ran a series in 2019, also called Contagion, that started with the spread of a dangerous virus taking out major heroes, like Doctor Strange and the Fantastic Four. Later, that infection is revealed to be a sentient being, hellbent on seeding a zombie invasion.
The coronavirus isn’t spreading as quickly, nor is it as deadly, as the “Meningoencephalitis Virus One” in Soderbergh’s Contagion, but that doesn’t mean it should be taken lightly. The risks posed by exposure to the virus even prompted the cancellation of several eSports events. Experts say symptoms can surface between two and 14 days after exposure and can include coughing, difficulty breathing, and a fever. There is currently no vaccine to prevent the virus. However, CNBC reports that “at least a dozen companies have informally or formally announced” development initiatives for a vaccine or drug treatment to combat the virus.
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Source: CinemaBlend
