Contagion Page #2

Synopsis: Soon after her return from a business trip to Hong Kong, Beth Emhoff dies from what is a flu or some other type of infection. Her young son dies later the same day. Her husband Mitch however seems immune. Thus begins the spread of a deadly infection. For doctors and administrators at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control, several days pass before anyone realizes the extent or gravity of this new infection. They must first identify the type of virus in question and then find a means of combating it, a process that will likely take several months. As the contagion spreads to millions of people worldwide, societal order begins to break down as people panic.
Genre: Drama, Thriller
Director(s): Steven Soderbergh
Production: Warner Bros.
  2 wins & 13 nominations.
 
IMDB:
6.6
Metacritic:
70
Rotten Tomatoes:
84%
PG-13
Year:
2011
106 min
$75,638,743
Website
9,098 Views


We're checking.

Mr. Neal, I want you to stay with me here.

Can you hear me?|Have you had seizures before? Mr. Neal?

- I want you to open your eyes if you can.|- He's breathing, right?

I couldn't wake him.|I got home, I couldn't wake him.

We both woke up sick this morning.

Watch your head.

Well, the sulci are obliterated.|Let's look at the base.

Oh, my God.

You want me to take a sample, or?

I want you to move away from the table.

- Should I call someone, or?|- Call everyone.

Well, these things happen|up there from time to time.

Meningitis in a college dorm|after a swim meet...

...or West Nile in some summer camp|near a lake.

I was reading that last summer they had|an outbreak of enterovirus encephalitis.

A hundred and three cases,|mainly children.

Well, it's probably too cold up there|for that right now.

As of last night,|there were five deaths and 32 cases.

There's a cluster|in an elementary school.

That's the kind of thing|you have to be prepared for.

It's gonna be all over the news.

What's your single overriding|communications objective?

We're isolating the sick and quarantining|those who we believe were exposed.

Okay, good.

As of this moment,|you and I are attached at the cell phone.

If you need resources, call me.|If you get into a political dogfight, call me.

If you find yourself wide awake,|staring at the walls at 3 a.m...

...wondering why you took the job,|call me.

I sure hope you packed something|warmer than that.

We're looking at around zero|with the windchill.

Don't want you to catch cold.

Do you wanna go to the hotel first,|get situated?

I'd prefer to get started, if that's possible.

- Okay.|- How far is the office?

About a half-hour from here.

Your dad's in isolation.

You can go up to the window,|pick up the phone, and you can talk to him.

- Hey.|- Dad.

- Hey.|- Are you sick?

No, no, no. I'm...

This is all just, you know, a precaution.|They're, you know, just making sure.

But you were with them.|You could still get it.

No, I won't. They said|this happens really, really fast.

And I'm fine.|There's nothing wrong with me.

There's nothing wrong with me.|We're okay. We're okay.

And Clark?

Yeah, you know, I...

I wasn't there.|I went in the ambulance with Beth.

And I just didn't... I...

I left him with Carrie Anne.

I should have been there.

- I could have helped.|- No, no, no. Honey, no, no.

It's good that you weren't there.|I'm happy.

If something had happened to you,|I mean, I'd...

Honey, you're here now, you know.|I'm happy about that.

I'm happy about that.

When are you coming home?

Soon. Very soon. They, you know...

- Why don't you go to your mom's?|- No.

- Just stay in Wisconsin.|- No. She doesn't need me.

She's got Dan. I live here.

You don't have anybody.|I'm not leaving you.

We have 47 cases|and eight deaths as of 5 this afternoon.

It's a weekend.|These numbers might be low.

People are staying home for a couple days,|see if they get better.

At this point, I think|we have to believe this is respiratory.

- Maybe fomites too.|- What's that, fomites?

It refers to transmission|from surfaces.

The average person touches their face|2- or 3000 times a day.

- Two- or 3000 times a day?|- Three to five times every waking minute.

In between, we're touching doorknobs...

...water fountains,|elevator buttons and each other.

Those things become fomites.

Is this something we wanna release|to the press? Respiratory and fomites?

- How's the public gonna react?|- Hard to say. A plastic shark in a movie...

...will keep people from getting|in the ocean, but a warning on cigarettes...

We need to walk the governor through this|before we freak everybody out.

I mean, we can't even tell people|right now what they should be afraid of.

We tried that with swine flu.|All we did was get healthy people scared.

It's the biggest shopping weekend|of the year.

We need to consider closing schools.

And who stays home with the kids?|People that work at stores.

Government workers.|People that work at hospitals.

When will we know what this is?|What causes it, what cures it?

Things that keep people calm.

What we need to determine is this:

For every person who gets sick...

...how many other people|are they likely to infect?

So for seasonal flu,|that's usually about one.

Smallpox, on the other hand,|it's over three.

Now, before we had a vaccine...

...polio spread at a rate|between four and six.

Now, we call that number...

...the R-nought.

R stands for the reproductive rate|of the virus.

Any ideas what that might be for this?

How fast it multiplies depends|on a variety of factors.

The incubation period,|how long a person is contagious.

Sometimes people can be contagious|without even having symptoms.

We need to know that too.

We need to know how big the population|of people susceptible to the virus might be.

So far that appears to be everyone|with hands, a mouth and a nose.

Once we know the R-nought, we'll be able|to get a handle on the scale of the epidemic.

So it's an epidemic now.|An epidemic of what?

We sent samples to the CDC.

In 72 hours, we'll know what it is,|if we're lucky.

Clearly, we're not lucky.

What do we got?

A young woman in Minnesota,|recently traveled to China.

Son also died.

As of this morning, 87 cases, 15 deaths.

- Did you have a good Thanksgiving?|- I worked.

You? Really?

Texas. Salmonella. Pretty limited.

Mine was great, thanks.

It's pleomorphic,|but tends toward ovoid in shape.

I see structures on the surface|that look like glycoproteins...

...but there's nothing|morphologically pathognomonic.

We tested all her antibodies.|I didn't see much cross-reactivity.

Her body had no idea what to do with it.|It just kept amplifying.

Send it to Sussman in San Francisco.

If he doesn't know what it is,|nobody does.

It shows novel characteristics|and appears to be chimeric in origin.

Virus is 15 to 19 kilobases in length|and containing six to 10 genes.

Typical of a paramyxovirus.

It's Godzilla, King Kong|and Frankenstein all in one.

- Hold on. Sh*t, I'll call you back.|- You've got it in there.

- Get away from here.|- Where'd it come from? Military?

You're not a doctor|and you're not a writer.

Yes, I am a writer. Yes, I am.

Blogging is not writing.|It's graffiti with punctuation.

I am a journalist, and there's|informed discussion on the blogosphere...

...that this is a biological weapon.

You wanna talk to me,|call my office and make an appointment.

- Dr. Cheever?|- Yes.

- Do you have a moment?|- Sure.

We found him. Tell the unit|on the way to his house to come in.

Excuse me. Who are you?

My name is Dennis French|with the Department of Homeland Security.

And what's this all about?

Rear Admiral Haggerty's expecting us|in the emergency operations center.

We can discuss it there.

This happened in Kowloon.

Today we've got workers at a casino|in Macao striking over conditions.

Three have died in one bunkhouse.|CIA thinks there may be a connection.

Casinos are of particular concern|to Homeland Security.

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Scott Z. Burns

Scott Z. Burns (born 1962) is an American screenwriter, producer, and director. Burns has written screenplays for The Bourne Ultimatum (2007), The Informant! (2009), and Contagion (2011), all of which feature Matt Damon. His films The Informant!, Contagion, and Side Effects were directed by Steven Soderbergh. Burns also produced the Academy Award-winning An Inconvenient Truth. In 2018, it was announced that Burns would direct The Torture Report, a drama about the secret torture program inside the CIA. Burns is a native of Golden Valley, Minnesota and graduated in 1985 with a degree in English from the University of Minnesota. He currently lives in Los Angeles. more…

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Submitted on August 05, 2018

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