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Films to Watch During a Pandemic

posted by janrinok on Monday March 02 2020, @02:18AM   
from the in-flight-film dept.

cafebabe writes:

Here's a quick overview of "documentaries" to watch before, during and after a pandemic:

The Andromeda Strain film: An early Michael Crichton adaptation which came before the Westworld film and series and the Jurassic Park film series. Like many Michael Crichton stories, factual science is extended with credible speculation. In this case, a prion-like infection has killed almost everyone in a village and the survivors are seemingly unrelated. The film is best known for its cartoonish but very photogenic indoor set which serves as the backdrop of a Level 4 Biolab. Such eloborate sets were common in the era. (Other examples include Rollerball and disaster parody/Airplane predecessor, The Big Bus.) The film features concurrent action which was a common experimental film technique in the 1960s but, nowadays, is most commonly associated with Kiefer Sutherland in the 24 series. There is also a lesser-known mini-series.

Outbreak: A rather dull film which nevertheless provides a graphic portrayal of uncontained pandemic and towns being quarantined. It would be marginally improved if the antagonists were re-cast. Possible source material for DeepFaking.

The Resident Evil film series: These films considerably advanced the tropes of amoral corporation, rogue artificial intelligence as antagonist, reality within reality, experimentation without informed consent and the horror of a medicalized vampire/zombie rabies virus. The Red Queen versus White Queen subplot dovetails with Alice in Wonderland, prey versus predator evolution and Umbrella Corp's red and white logo which - in a case of life mirroring art - was copied by Wuhan's Level 4 Biolab. Many people prefer the competent and detailed Resident Evil series of computer games which are arguably better than the Half Life series or the SCP game.

28 Days Later, 28 Weeks Later, 28 Months Later: Gritty films which borrow liberally from Resident Evil and a rich seam of British, Cold War, post-apocalyptic drama, such as Survivors. The most iconic scenes of the film - Central London without people - weren't composited or closed for filming. They were merely shot at dawn, on a Sunday morning, around the summer solstice. The first film may have influenced Black Mirror episodes: The National Anthem and White Bear.

World War Z: If Dan Brown wrote zombie stories, they'd be like World War Z. Brad Pitt's character dashes to a number of exotic locations and is swept up by events such as panic buying and stampedes from an unspecified infection which has an incubation period of about 20 seconds. (A duration which appears to have been chosen to maximize tension while staying within the one minute beat sheet of the Hero's Journey monomyth.) It builds upon the zombie mythology of Resident Evil and 28 Day Later. However, it is undermined by cheap grading, cheap compositing and reliance on flocking software.

Contagion: I haven't seen this one. It may or may not involve Gwyneth Paltrow, Harvey Weinstein, an Oscars acceptance speech, Seth MacFarlane and a vaginal steamer. Well, it probably relieves the itching of genital herpes.

Cloverfield 1, 2, 3 and 4: Found footage genre which is heavily influenced by the Blair Witch Project (obviously), Godzilla films, The Day the Earth Stood Still, any B-movie with a military Jeep and medicalized zombie films. The first film has fantastic compositing which may be of particular interest to anyone working on an augmented reality horror game.

Bad Taste: Peter Jackson's first commercial film. It was almost unfinished due to the ridiculous ending which blatently copies from a film which - to prevent spoiler - I won't mention. A particularly low budget effect was used for gun flash. Specifically, the original 16mm footage was poked with a pin. Regardless, if you've seen the carnage of Peter Jackson's orc battles then you may be curious to see the carnage of Peter Jackson's zombie fights. Additionally, Bad Taste works particularly well as a drinking game.

George A. Romero and John A. Russo films: These classics brought zombies out of a largely undifferentiated mess of vampire/mummy/voodoo/swamp monster B-movies. Unfortunately, they have been overshadowed by escalating gore and violence. This leave each classic looking more like an extended episode of the A-Team.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies: Anything is more exciting with zombies and Jane Austen's dull novel certainly benefits. This wilfully inaccurate historical drama, a genre shared with Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter and Snow White and the Seven Samurai, features square dancing and blunderbuss zombie carnage.

Any better suggestions out there?

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Original Submission

• 12 Monkeys 12 Monkeys (Score: 5, Informative) by barbara hudson on Monday March 02 2020, @02:35AM (1 child)

  by barbara hudson (6443) <barbara.Jane.hudson@icloud.com> on Monday March 02 2020, @02:35AM (#965217) Journal

  12 Monkeys [wikipedia.org]

  A deadly virus released in 1996 wipes out almost all of humanity, forcing survivors to live underground. A group known as the Army of the Twelve Monkeys is believed to have released the virus. In 2035, James Cole is a prisoner living in a subterranean compound beneath the ruins of Philadelphia. Cole is selected to be trained and sent back in time to find the original virus, in order to help scientists develop a cure. Meanwhile, Cole is troubled by recurring dreams involving a foot chase and shooting at an airport.

  Cole arrives in Baltimore in 1990, not 1996 as planned. He is arrested, then hospitalized in a mental hospital on the diagnosis of Dr. Kathryn Railly. There he encounters Jeffrey Goines, a mental patient with fanatical environmentalist and anti-corporatist views. Cole is interviewed by a panel of doctors, and he tries to explain that the virus outbreak has already happened, and nobody can change it. After an escape attempt, Cole is sedated and locked in a cell, but disappears moments later, and wakes up back in 2035. He is interrogated by the scientists, who play a distorted voicemail message that asserts the association of the Army of the Twelve Monkeys with the virus. He is also shown photos of numerous people suspected of being involved, including Goines. The scientists offer Cole a second chance to complete his mission and send him back in time. He arrives at a battlefield during World War I, is shot in the leg, and then is suddenly transported to 1996.

  In 1996, Railly gives a lecture about the Cassandra complex to a group of scientists. At the post-lecture book signing, she meets Dr. Peters, who tells her that apocalypse alarmists represent the sane vision, while humanity's gradual destruction of the environment is the real lunacy. Cole arrives at the venue after seeing flyers publicizing it, and when Railly departs, he kidnaps her and forces her to take him to Philadelphia. They learn that Goines is the founder of the Army of the Twelve Monkeys, and set out in search of him. When they confront him, Goines denies any involvement with the group and says that in 1990 Cole originated the idea of wiping out humanity with a virus stolen from Goines' virologist father.

  About to be apprehended by police, Cole is transported back to 2035, where he reaffirms to the scientists his commitment to his mission. But when he finds Railly again in 1996, he tells her he now believes himself crazy as she had suggested all along. Railly, meanwhile, has discovered evidence of his time travel, which she shows him, and she no longer believes he is insane. They decide to depart for the Florida Keys before the onset of the plague. On their way to the airport, they learn that the Army of the Twelve Monkeys was not the source of the epidemic; the group's major act of protest is releasing animals from a zoo and placing Goines' father in an animal cage.

  At the airport, Cole leaves a last message telling the scientists that in following the Army of the Twelve Monkeys they are on the wrong track, and that he will not return. He is soon confronted by Jose, an acquaintance from his own time, who gives Cole a handgun and ambiguously instructs him to follow orders. At the same time, Railly spots Dr. Peters, and recognizes him from a newspaper photograph as an assistant at Goines' father's virology lab. Peters is about to embark on a tour of several cities that match the locations and sequence of the viral outbreaks.

  Cole forces his way through a security checkpoint in pursuit of Peters. After drawing the gun he was given, Cole is fatally shot by police. As Cole lies dying in Railly's arms, Railly suddenly begins to scan the crowd around her, seemingly looking for something she knows must be there. She finally makes eye contact with a small boy—the young James Cole witnessing the scene of his own death, which will replay in his dreams for years to come. Peters, safely aboard the plane with the virus, sits down next to Jones, one of the scientists from the future, who comments that her job is “insurance.”

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• Re:12 Monkeys (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @02:52PM

  by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2020, @02:52PM (#965499)

  Thank you. I couldn't believe this movie wasn't listed on the front page of the article. Like all Terry Gilliam movies, this one is brilliant in its story as well as cinematography.

  Parent