Introduction by Marlene Ardoin
Astrologers seem to think that Covid-19 will have a solution around January 12th, 2021, quieting down during the summer, then raging again September through mid-December of 2020.
In the meanwhile, the films included here will give some tips on how to stay safe.
What I liked about all of these films was the casting of women in the roles of doctors, who possess character, self-sacrifice and intelligence.
We need to be aware that pandemics can happen in our environment in many ways.
If you click on the links of Pandemic (2006) and Contagious (1997), you will be able to watch the entire movie.
Outbreak (1995) with Dustin Hoffman and Rene Russo was the most entertaining to watch, except, one of the options selected was to drop a bomb on an entire population to contain an outbreak.
In Contagion (2011) with Matt Damon, people go crazy, like rushing out to grab everything off the grocery shelves, only crazier.
Pandemic (2006) addresses the problem of independent individuals, who do not believe the facts, and who may even want to make a profit off the circumstances.
The movie theaters are still not open, so I thought that it might be good to watch something on the 4th of July that could be useful as well as entertaining.
Stay well and try to enjoy your 4th of July.
Pandemic (2006)
With Tiffani-Amber Thiessen, French Stewart, Faye Dunaway,
Kevin Kiner, Armand Mastroianni, and Jennifer Jean Cacavas
Pandemic | Coronavirus Movie /Full Movie
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YiBZp2JXXI
Plot:
On a beach in Australia, two American surfers say goodbye to each other as one is about to leave for his flight back to California. The two men don’t notice the large number of dead birds on the beach. On the flight, the surfer returning home starts coughing up blood and dies before the plane can land. Back in Australia, the other surfer is found dead in his apartment. Kayla Martin (Tiffani Thiessen) is a medical doctor with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) who has been assigned to the case. She and the local officials carry the body of the surfer out of the plane and start processing people to be put in quarantine until they can be evaluated for exposure. During the transfer, one of the passengers escapes to complete a business deal and unknowingly spreads the virus throughout Los Angeles. It is also revealed that outbreaks of the so-called “riptide virus” (as it comes to be known), an offshoot of the bird flu, are occurring in other cities around the world.
The situation is complicated further when one of the passengers, a convicted drug lord being transported by the FBI, escapes with the help of associates and a number of the other passengers, some of whom are infected. He proceeds to steal the medication needed to fight the outbreak and blackmails the local and state officials. As the epidemic worsens and the death toll rises all over California, the governor (Faye Dunaway) and mayor (Eric Roberts) have to find a way around their political differences so that they can make tough decisions dealing with the blackmail scheme, as well as a frightened populace and all of the problems associated with a widespread and deadly epidemic.
At the end, Kayla and her scientist team are able to find a cure: the drug lord’s clear immunity to the virus is caused by his concurrent tuberculosis infection. Tubercular antibodies stop the virus from attaching to his lungs. They discover that administering antibodies from persons who have tuberculosis will cure the infected and give the others immunity from the virus. Blood from tuberculosis-infected persons is purified and administered to people, and Los Angeles is saved.
Contagious (1997) | Lindsay Wagner Full Thriller
With Lindsay Wagner, Elizabeth Peña, Ken Pogue, Brendan Fletcher.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qDzYxXLdqyE
Plot:
A plane where shrimp tainted with cholera was served, arrives from South America to Los Angeles. Soon after, the first patient dies from the disease. Because this person was a cocaine dealer, there is some suspicion that the drug is somehow related to the disease. Therefore, a narcotics detective (Elizabeth Peña) is put on the case, while in the hospital an experienced doctor (Lindsay Wagner) tries to prevent the outbreak from turning into an epidemic.
Outbreak (1995)
With Dustin Hoffman, Rene Russo, Morgan Freeman and Donald Sutherland, and co-stars Cuba Gooding Jr., Kevin Spacey and Patrick Dempsey.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5povsMKfT4
Plot:
In 1967, during the Kisangani Mutinies, a virus called Motaba, which causes a deadly fever, is discovered in the African jungle. To keep the virus a secret, U.S. Army officers Donald McClintock and Billy Ford destroy the camp where soldiers were infected.
Twenty-eight years later, Colonel Sam Daniels, a USAMRIID virologist, is sent to investigate an outbreak in Zaire. He and his crew—Lieutenant Colonel Casey Schuler and new recruit Major Salt—gather information and return to the United States. Ford, now a brigadier general and Daniels’ superior officer, dismisses the latter’s fears that the virus will spread.
Betsy, a white-headed capuchin monkey that is host to the virus, is smuggled into the country. James “Jimbo” Scott, a worker at an animal testing laboratory, is infected when he steals Betsy to sell on the black market. Jimbo fails to sell Betsy to Rudy Alvarez (who also becomes infected), a pet-store owner in the coastal-California village of Cedar Creek. After releasing the monkey in the woods outside of the nearby community of Palisades, he develops symptoms on a flight to Boston and infects his girlfriend, Alice. Their illness is investigated by Dr. Roberta Keough, a CDC scientist and Daniels’ ex-wife. Jimbo, Alice, and Rudy die, but Keough determines that no one else in Boston was infected.
A hospital technician in Cedar Creek is infected when he accidentally breaks the vial of Rudy’s blood. The virus quickly mutates into a strain capable of spreading like influenza, becoming airborne and causing a number of people to be infected in a movie theater. Daniels flies to Cedar Creek against Ford’s orders, joining Keough’s team with Schuler and Salt. As they begin a search for the monkey, the Army quarantines the town and imposes martial law. Schuler is infected when his suit tears and Keough accidentally sticks herself with a contaminated needle while treating him.
When Ford provides an experimental serum which cures the original strain, Daniels realizes that he was aware of the virus before the outbreak. Daniels learns about Operation Clean Sweep, a plan for the military to contain the virus by bombing Cedar Creek, incinerating the town and its residents, ostensibly to prevent Motaba’s expansion to pandemic proportions. However, McClintock, now a major general, plans to use the operation to conceal the virus’s existence so it can be preserved for use as a biological weapon.
To prevent Daniels from finding a cure, McClintock orders him arrested for carrying the virus. Daniels escapes before he and Salt fly a helicopter to the ship at sea which carried Betsy. Daniels obtains a picture of Betsy and releases it to the media; a Palisades resident, Mrs. Jeffries, realizes that her daughter Kate has been playing with Betsy in their yard and calls the CDC. Daniels and Salt arrive at the Jeffries’ house where Salt tranquilizes Betsy after Kate coaxes her out of hiding in the woods nearby. When he learns from Daniels about Betsy’s capture, Ford delays the bombing.
On their return flight, Daniels and Salt are chased by McClintock in another helicopter. Salt fires two rockets into the trees to deceive him into thinking that they crashed. Once back in Cedar Creek, Salt mixes Betsy’s antibodies with Ford’s serum to create an antiserum; although Schuler has died, they save Keough. McClintock returns to base and resumes Operation Clean Sweep, refusing to listen to Ford. Daniels and Salt fly their helicopter directly into the path of the bomber’s approach to its target.
With Ford’s help, Daniels persuades the bomber’s flight crew to detonate the bomb over water and spare the town. Before McClintock can order another bombing, Ford relieves him of command and orders his arrest. Daniels and Keough reconcile as Cedar Creek’s residents are cured.
Contagion (2011)
With Matt Damon, Laurence Fishburne, Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Kate Winslet, Bryan Cranston, Jennifer Ehle
Plot:
Returning from a Hong Kong business trip, Beth Emhoff meets with a former lover during a Chicago layover. Two days later, back home in suburban Minneapolis, she collapses with seizures. Her husband, Mitch Emhoff, rushes her to the hospital, but she dies of an unknown cause. Returning home, Mitch finds that his stepson, Clark, has also died. Mitch is isolated but found to be naturally immune; after being released, Mitch protectively keeps his teenage daughter, Jory, quarantined at their house.
In Atlanta, Department of Homeland Security representatives meet with Dr. Ellis Cheever of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention over concerns that the disease may be a bioweapon. Cheever dispatches Dr. Erin Mears, an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer, to Minneapolis where she traces everyone who had contact with Beth. She negotiates with reluctant local bureaucrats to commit resources for a public health response. Soon after, Mears becomes infected and dies. As the novel virus spreads, several cities are placed under quarantine, causing wide-spread looting and violence.
At the CDC, Dr. Ally Hextall determines the virus is a combination of genetic material from pig and bat-borne viruses. Research on a cure stalls because scientists are unable to discover a cell culture within which to grow the newly identified MEV-1. Dr. Cheever determines the virus too virulent to be researched at multiple labs and restricts all work to one government site. Dr. Hextall orders University of California researcher Dr. Ian Sussman to destroy his samples. Believing he is close to finding a viable cell culture, Sussman violates Cheever’s order and eventually identifies a usable MEV-1 cell culture using bat cells, from which Hextall develops a vaccine. Other scientists determine the virus is spread by respiratory droplets and fomites, with a basic reproduction number of four when the virus mutates; they project that 1 in 12 of the world population will be infected, with a 25–30% mortality rate.
Conspiracy theorist Alan Krumwiede posts videos about the virus on his blog. In one video, he claims to have cured himself of the virus using a homeopathic cure derived from forsythia. People seeking forsythia overwhelm pharmacies, turning violent when limited supplies run out. During a television interview, Krumwiede discloses that Cheever secretly warned his fiancée to leave Chicago before quarantine was declared. Cheever is informed he will be investigated. Krumwiede, having faked being infected to boost sales of forsythia, is arrested for conspiracy and securities fraud.
Using an attenuated virus, Hextall identifies a potential vaccine. To expedite the vaccine development, Hexall bypasses the informed consent test subject process. She instead inoculates herself with the experimental vaccine, then visits her infected father. She does not contract MEV-1 and the vaccine is declared a success. The CDC awards vaccinations by lottery based on birthdates. By this time, the death toll has reached 2.5 million in the U.S. and 26 million worldwide.
Earlier in Hong Kong, World Health Organization epidemiologist Dr. Leonora Orantes and public health officials comb through security video tapes of Beth’s contacts in a Macau casino and identify her as the index case. Government official Sun Feng kidnaps Orantes as leverage to obtain MEV-1 vaccine doses for his village, holding her for months. WHO officials provide the village with earliest vaccines and Orantes is released. When she learns the vaccines were placebos, she runs to warn the village.
In a flashback to the spillover event, a bulldozer razes palm trees while clearing a rainforest in China, disturbing some bats’ natural habitat. One bat finds shelter in a pig farm and drops an infected piece of banana, which is eaten by a pig. The pig is slaughtered and prepared by a chef in a Macau casino, who transmits the virus to Beth via a handshake.
7/4/2020 # The Covid-19 Films – – Pandemic (2006), Contagious (1997), Outbreak (1995), Contagion (2011)