We start the Top 7. You finish the Top 10.
Getting sick sucks, getting the plague... that's horror film territory. This week, Steven Soderbergh releases his Contagion (starring Matt Damon, Jude Law, Kate Winslet and everyone else in Hollywood) into movie theaters. Hopefully it'll catch on! Get it? Because you catch a disease and... OK. Here are the TOP 7 Movie Epidemics.
7. Outbreak (1995)
Recap: An all-star disaster movie starring Dustin Hoffman, Rene Russo, Kevin Spacey, Morgan Freeman and Donald Sutherland about an Ebola-like virus. A bunch of people get infected with "Motaba" after coming into contact with an infected primate. Only an USAMRIID virologist and a CDC investigator have the tenacity and the balls to save the world from a deadly outbreak. Reason: This movie fits the bill for this top 7 list perfectly. Too bad it's so disappointing. It didn't help that I had read Richard Preston's The Hot Zone before seeing this film. These filmmakers didn't have the rights to the book, so they based it on a real life incident (that actually was written about in the book). Unfortunately, the plot just feels outlandish. I mean, the monkey starts at a medical facility, then it's at a pet store, then it's loose in the woods? Really? Why is no one watching this monkey? If they made a sequel, it should have been a children's comedy called "Outbreak Monkey! The Musical."
6. I Am Legend (2007)
Recap: Will Smith is the last man alive in Manhattan. After a plague transforms most of humanity into vampires (the not sexy kind), Smith and his dog are alone in the city, looking for fellow survivors and hunting deer. He still hopes to find a cure, and when he thinks he's got one, he knows it's time to move on. Reason: I thought the movie started out pretty well. Smith has enough charisma to act opposite a dog and carry the movie for awhile. Then the dog dies. Why did they kill the dog? You never do that! I kind of checked out of the movie after that. Also, I made the mistake of reading the book right before seeing the film, and the book had a way better ending.
5. Carriers (2009)
Recap: Two brothers and their lady friends journey through an America ravaged by a infectious virus that has killed much of the population. To survive, they've established certain rules. Anyone infected is already dead, and compassion can kill you. Brian (Chris Pine) seems like a cruel leader, but he's also keeping everyone alive. Reason: The concept is promising and for awhile Carriers works. A pre-Star Trek Pine stars as a tough guy who seems like a little bit of a jerk. But then you realize that even touching an object touched by an infected person in the last 24 hours could kill you, so his character's paranoia starts to make sense. The film works best when it shows the characters vacillating between compassion and their desire to stay alive. Unfortunately some drawn out confrontations, including a long segment about a cure, go nowhere. The tension from the beginning peters out somewhere around the middle.
4. Blindness (2008)
Recap: An epidemic of blindness strikes an unnamed city. The first people stricken are removed to an isolated hospital. A doctor's wife goes to the hospital with him, pretending to also be blind. As the only sighted person in a blind world, she has power but is also a target for anyone who knows her secret, including an unscrupulous group who take over the hospital. Reason: Based on an allegorical novel by Pulitzer Prize winner Jose Saramago, Blindness isn't a typical epidemic movie. This epidemic doesn't kill, it just leaves it's victims sightless after a lifetime of being able to see. The disease isn't so scary, it's the way society completely devolves, witnessed through the microcosm that is the group in the hospital. The film doesn't work in quite the same way as the book. Saramago's writing style can't be matched. But it's still a horrifying look at how close society is to breaking down. If you haven't noticed yet, that's really a theme here.
3. Slither (2006)
Recap: An alien parasite arrives in a small town via a meteor and starts infecting the local populace. The few remaining uninfected townspeople must fight to kill the main creepy crawly who's slowly turning his host into a gross, slug-like creature. Reason: Epidemics don't all have to be serious, especially when they're this gross. The comedy-horror film stars Nathan Fillion and Elizabeth Banks who are adept at either genre. The film's a little weird, but it's also a lot of fun. It mixes gross-outs, sex, and ridiculous situations in a fun way. Fillion needs to star in more movies, period.
2. 12 Monkeys (1995)
Recap: Terry Gilliam's remake of La Jetee takes a different path but still packs a familiar punch. Bruce Willis is a prisoner who travels back in time in an effort to thwart a future plague. His struggle isn't just to stop the virus, but also whether he can even influence the future. Reason: Ostensibly about an epidemic, the story looks at free will versus fate with a killer ending. The title is itself a red herring, the 12 Monkeys are a militant group believed to be responsible for the plague. Gilliam enjoys running his protagonist down blind alleyways to nowhere, but it's such a crazy, frantic journey that I enjoyed it as well. Plus, it has one of the truly great endings in film.
1. 28 Days Later (2002)
Recap: A bicycle messenger awakens from a coma to learn that a virus called "Rage" has killed most of the population of London, turning those left alive into really fast zombies. Jim (Cillian Murphy) gathers together a group of fellow survivors who go in search of a place free of the zombie plague. Reason: Responsible, for better or worse, for the zombie renaissance, 28 Days Later is scary and immediate. It has a terrifying plague with really gross zombies but the characters also have to contend with a sadistic military installation led by future Dr. Who Christopher Eccleston. Everything moves quickly, it feels even more immediate since the movie is shot on digital video (it was still a relatively uncommon choice then). Director Danny Boyle came back after the debacle of The Beach with a tight, fast action movie that is everything his previous film wasn't. We'll see if Contagion can unseat it.