🎬 #134 Fear Is Contagious.
We’ve lived through a pandemic. Pretty crazy just to write that. We’ve seen how things unfolded first hand. We’ve felt the fear, the uncertainty - and we’ve endured the distinct pangs of paranoia. Especially in the early stages when everyone was still trying to figure out exactly what the virus was and how bad it was going to get.
The dramatic engines of both this week’s films are fuelled by all those emotions. One in particular, pretty much nailed the experience of what the pandemic turned out to be.
Maybe now that we’ve had a little bit of distance from Covid, we can dive back into the paranoia-filled air of these thriller/horrors. At least before the next pandemic comes around.
Happy choosing, happy viewing
Bry
FILM ONE: CONTAGION
2011 Dir Steven Soderbergh
1 hr 46 mins
I hadn’t seen this film since at least 2020. Looking back on it - it’s incredible just how accurate the film’s depiction of how a pandemic would unfold is. No surprise that Soderbergh and Burns, the screenwriter, had extensive conversations with people whose lives have been dedicated to the study of viruses. From scientists, through to healthcare officials at the CDC, and epidemiologists, they painstakingly researched every facet of how a virus and information would spread. What results, is a detailed and viscerally believable portrayal of a modern virus unleashing havoc on a hyper-connected planet.
In fact the drama and tragedy of the film is amplified by the fact that its based in very concrete science. It’s a procedural that unfolds in the body of a thriller. Little moments, like the planning that goes into how to treat the thousands of inevitable patients in a sport’s stadium is eerie in its implications, even before we saw the same thing for real. It’s in these moments, the nuance and specificity that the film captivates. The feet on the ground CCTV scouring, the desperation of rogue agents, the kind-hearted sharing of information as well as the spread of mis-information for profit, give us one of Soderbergh’s most dense but most enjoyable films.
Him and his team balanced this one to perfection - it has an amazing pace that never lets up but also never feels overwhelming. He’s captured the personal horror that fighting this disease entails, as well as the political manoeuvrings on a global scale.
TL;DR: Soderbergh's frighteningly accurate portrayal of a global pandemic still holds us on the edge of our seats.
*Available for a small rental fee on Apple and Amazon in the US and the UK. But also available to stream on Prime in the UK.
Fact: Steven Soderbergh makes a small audio cameo at the start of the film. Gwyneth Paltrow’s character is speaking to someone on the phone, he plays the voice on the other side.
FILM TWO: IT COMES AT NIGHT
2017 Dir Trey Edward Shults
1 hr 31 mins
Talk about great posters. When the above image, along with the excellent teaser trailer landed, my interest was firmly peaked. A mysterious threat only hinted at made it all the more bold, all the more compelling. Whereas Soderbergh’s is a vividly real portrayal of a pandemic, captivatingly told in a procedural thriller form, Shult’s film veers more directly into the horror genre. Dread and paranoia are felt in every framing choice, every twitch of a character.
We’re thrust into an isolated homestead surrounded by woods. A family is hunkered down, surviving, while the rest of the unseen world seems to be dealing with the consequences of a threat we’re yet to fully understand. This is the strength of Shults’ film, as seen from the poster - the threat could be a ghost, a monster, a serial killer. We’re literally left in the dark - not really knowing what to expect. And that is the perfect breeding ground for paranoia.
That’s what this film digs into, the impossible choices that we have to make in impossible circumstances. The darkness that tribalism can inspire and the lengths someone will go to protect his or her own are all dissected in front of us. Letting us wonder what we’d do in similar circumstances.
TL;DR: Schults’ paranoid, horror thriller shows us just how delicate the balance between kind human and brutal animal really is.
*Available for a small rental fee on Apple and Amazon in the US and the UK.
Fact: The director said the title was the first thing that came to him, before plot or character’s were even developed.