A Fast-Moving Virus Is in the Air in 'Contagion'

Sanaa Lathan and Matt Damon on Wednesday at the New York premiere of "Contagion" at the Rose Theater at Lincoln Center. Photos by Charles Norfleet/ASJAIS Images.

IT’S spreading. It’s deadly ...

Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow) returns to her Minneapolis home from a Hong Kong business trip with jetlag. Two days later Beth is dead. This is where the action picks up in “Contagion.”

Directed by Steven Soderbergh from a screenplay by Scott Z. Burns, “Contagion” (see trailer below) opens nationwide today.” (Some other films opening today: “Warrior,” “Kevin Hart: Laugh at My Pain,” “Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star” and “Creature”).

Soon symptoms that plagued Beth – cough, fever, seizure, brain hemorrhage, death –plague a few, hundreds, thousands, then … A pandemic is born. With the world in panic and a race on for a cure, politics and jockeying enter the fray.



Will the world be saved by an airborne virus that can kill in days or will money interests, competition, ego and hubris end it as we know it? In addition to GP, on hand in "Contagion" to provide action and answers is an all-star cast of mostly Oscar winners and/or Oscar nominees, including Marion Cotillard, Bryan Cranston, Matt Damon, Jennier Ehle, Lawrence Fishburne, Jude Law, Sanaa Lathan and Kate Winslet.

“Contagion” is rated PG-13 for disturbing content and some language.