It comes as no real surprise that, as we all hunker down and remain sequestered to avoid the spread COVID-19, streaming services have more than doubled in the past month or so. Among the most popular titles during this time, aside from Tiger King reigning supreme, are Wolfgang Peterson’s Outbreak, the Netflix original Pandemic, and Steven Soderbergh’s Contagion.
As for the latter, Contagion was released on the weekend of September 11, 2011. It’s as if Soderbergh was deliberately sounding the alarm for the next major catastrophe to strike. A sobering thought. With the plot of the film parallels the lives we’re all currently living, here are 10 facts you didn’t know about Contagion!
Marketing
To help market the film in Canada, Warner Bros. constructed two giant, highly-detailed Petri dishes populated with fungi and bacteria and placed them in the window of a prominent store in Toronto.
Over time, the bacteria and fungi reacted and grew out to spell the word Contagion in the dishes, replete with ominous biohazard symbols. Despite the horror, the film opened number one at the box-office during its first week of release, beating out The Help in the process. Ironically Help is exactly what we all need now!
Consultant
To ensure the utmost scientific accuracy, an epidemiology professor at Columbia University Dr. Ian Lipkin was hired as a consultant on the film. Guess what? He also created the virus depicted in the film.
According to Lipkin, he based the virus in Contagion – labeled MEV-1 – on some of the characteristics of the Nipah virus that was borne in Malaysia during the late 1990s. The Nipah virus was believed to spread from pigs to farmers. In 1999, millions of pigs were killed in Malaysia to prevent further contamination. That said, MEV-1 had more than just porcine properties.
MEV-1
Just like it’s believed with COVID-19, the MEV-1 virus in Contagion also derives in part from bat strains. MEV-1 is actually a hybrid of bat and pig viral strains similar to a pair of well-known epidemics of recent memory.
At the end of the film, notice how a sample of the MEV-1 virus is stored in a secure medical lab. The doctor hangs the sample right next to the H1N1 virus, which was derived from pigs, and the SARS virus, which is believed to have originated in bats. That’s an awfully prescient detail that forewarned the situation we all find ourselves in at the moment.
Accuracy
Contagion has been widely hailed for being one of the most scientifically accurate Hollywood productions. In 2011, the publication New Scientist wrote an article detailing the rigorous attempts to keep the movie as rooted in scientific facts as possible.
As a result, the scene where Dr. Hextall (Jennifer Ehle) injects herself with a vaccine needed to be reshot because, as Dr. Lipkin put it, a doctor of Hextall’s caliber would never incorrectly administer the vaccine through a layer of clothing.
Chronicle Newsdesk
In keeping with the accuracy and authenticity of the film, a cool tidbit involving an infamous SF Chronicle newsdesk makes a cameo in Contagion.
Jude Law plays Chronicle reporter Alan Krumwiede in the film, which is loosely based on real-life SF beat reporter Benny Evangelista. Well, Evangelista’s real desk, known for its messiness, was used in the film as the workplace of Lorraine Vasquez (Monique Gabriela Curnen). The desk is left intact and untouched in the film!
Outbreak Shoutout
A really cool and coy nod to Wolfgang Peterson’s similarly-themed viral thriller Outbreak can be spotted by Eagle-eyed Contagion viewers. Hint, it has to do with the date March 10th!
Indeed, in Contagion, the CDC decides that those born on March 10th will be the first to receive the MEV-1 vaccine. Well, March 10th marked the original U.S. date that Outbreak was released in 1995. Of course, the forerunning viral blockbuster dealt with a monkey-born disease, pitting the A-list likes of Dustin Hoffman, Morgan Freeman, Kevin Spacey, and Rene Russo up against the pandemic.
Freebies
The cast of Contagion features five Oscar winners, including Soderbergh, Matt Damon, Marion Cotillard, Gwynyth Paltrow, and Kate Winslet. An additional five Oscar nominees participated in the film as well. And they all did so for next to nothing.
Indeed, most of the cast members agreed to be in the film for little to no pay. Paltrow essentially filmed her part for free over the course of three days. This tells us that the actors cared far more about telling an important story than obtaining personal fortunes. Bryan Cranston, for example, was hardly even mentioned among promotional material despite being at the height of his Breaking Bad popularity.
Russian Poster
Just like it’s U.S. counterpart, the Russian poster for Contagion also features nine letters. But did you know that each letter of the Zara(zh)enie title also denotes the global cities infected in the flick?
True talk. From top to bottom, the letters of the Russian poster stand for the following cities: Kazan, Atlanta, San Francisco, Chicago, Paris, Geneva, London, Tokyo, and Perm. One letter from each is capitalized and highlighted in a row, spelling out the word Zara(zh)enie.
Filming
As he often does, Soderbergh served as his own cinematographer on Contagion. Always at the forefront of cinematic technology, Soderbergh shot the entire film using the RED One Mx Digital Camera. It was also the first of Soderbergh’s movies to be released in IMAX.
Filming took place all over the globe. A two-week shoot in Hong Kong began production before moving to Chicago and eventually Atlanta, where the Center for Disease Control (CDC) is headquartered. London, Geneva, and San Francisco followed suit. Filming took place from September 2010 to January 2011.
Popularity Hike
The outbreak of COVID-19 has directly led to a massive rise in Contagion‘s popularity. As a result, the film shot to the top of the rental and purchase charts on iTunes.
Moreover, Warner Bros. has reported that, at the end of December 2019, Contagion was listed as the 270th most popular title among its online catalog. Since January 2020, the film has risen to the number two spot, becoming the second-most popular title behind only the Harry Potter pictures.
