| Outbreak | |
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 The movie poster for Outbreak |
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| Directed by | Wolfgang Petersen |
| Produced by | Duncan Henderson Anne Kopelson Gail Katz |
| Written by | Laurence Dworet Robert Roy Pool |
| Starring | Dustin Hoffman Rene Russo Morgan Freeman Cuba Gooding Jr. Patrick Dempsey With Donald Sutherland And Kevin Spacey |
| Music by | James Newton Howard |
| Editing by | Neil Travis |
| Distributed by | Warner Brothers |
| Release date(s) | March 10, 1995 |
| Running time | 127 min. |
| Language | English |
| IMDb | |
Outbreak (1995) is a suspense film starring Dustin Hoffman, Rene Russo, Morgan Freeman and Kevin Spacey. The film was directed by Wolfgang Petersen. In addition, Outbreak features Cuba Gooding Jr., Donald Sutherland, and Patrick Dempsey.
The film focuses on an outbreak of a fictional Ebola-like virus called Motaba. Its primary settings are government disease control centers USAMRIID and the CDC, and the fictional town of Cedar Creek, California. Outbreak shows how far the military and civilian agencies might go to contain the spread.
The film was released in March 1995 and proved a solid box office success. The film was nominated for various awards but failed to garner any major award nominations. It also raised various "what-if" scenarios: media outlets began to question what the government would really do in a similar situation and if the CDC has plans in case an outbreak ever does occur. A real-life outbreak of the Ebola virus occurred in Zaire only a few months after the film was released.
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Synopsis
The Motaba virus is discovered in the African jungles in 1967 and kept top-secret. The discovery is covered up by two army men, who destroyed the mercenary camp where the virus was discovered with a fuel-air bomb, a specially-designed conventional weapon capable of very high explosive yields.
Twenty-five years later, it resurfaces in Africa again. Col. Sam Daniels (Hoffman), an USAMRIID virologist is sent to investigate the Motaba case with his crew. He and his crew contain the virus and return to the United States where he asks his superior, General Ford (Freeman), to put out an alert for the virus. Gen. Ford, who knows the virus is not new, tells Daniels that it is unlikely to show up. What neither of the men knows is that the host animal, a White-fronted Capuchin Monkey, has been brought to the U.S. on a ship to be sold illegally in the pet trade. Jimbo Scott (Dempsey) bribes a guard at the shipping location and takes the monkey to Cedar Creek to sell for breeding. On the trip, the monkey spits in Jimbo's face, infecting him.
Once Jimbo arrives at the pet store in Cedar Creek, the owner of the store tells him he got the wrong gender but only after the monkey has scratched him, infecting him. Jimbo then takes the monkey and releases him into the woods of California. Jimbo starts to show signs of infection on his plane trip to Boston where he gets off the plane and kisses his girlfriend, infecting her. They are both hospitalized and Daniels' ex-wife, Robby (Russo), is called in to investigate this infection. While all of this is going on, the owner of the pet store in Cedar Creek begins to show signs of infection as well. All three of them later die. Robby investigates and concludes that everybody in Boston checked out all right.
While the techs in the hospital are running tests on the pet store owner's blood, a vial in a centrifuge breaks and splatters blood on Henry Seward since he was not paying attention on his work but on the baseball game on TV, infecting him. Later on, he goes to a packed movie theater and coughs, expels, and exposes hundreds of citizens of Cedar Creek to the virus and thus starts the massive Cedar Creek outbreak. Col. Daniels learns of the infection and that it has become airborne. He wants to be sent to Cedar Creek but has been ordered to go to New Mexico, the site of an outbreak of Hantavirus by Ford (to prevent Daniels from learning too much on the Motaba virus). Daniels disobeys orders and flies to Cedar Creek where he joins Robby and the rest of the crew, with Gen. Ford leaving him alone to do his job after learning of the airborne mutation. They work on isolating the town, especially the sick, and finding out where the virus came from. They find out about the pet store owner and believe that a host animal at the store may be carrying antibodies. They search the store and find a monkey; the monkey is already sick but they contain it and examine it. Meanwhile, a state of martial law has been declared in Cedar Creek, and the U.S. army has taken complete control of the town to contain the outbreak. A civilian attempt to break out of the quarantine fails, discouraging others from attempting to escape as well.
While in Cedar Creek, several accidents happen. Casey's (Spacey) protective suit tears and he is infected with the virus. While treating Casey, Robby pokes herself with a dirty needle infecting herself. A mystery serum, E-1101, is introduced to those suffering from Motaba. Daniels wonders what this is and administers it to the infected monkey obtained from the pet store. The monkey gets better but the citizens of Cedar Creek do not; Daniels realizes that E-1101 is not experimental and people knew about this virus beforehand. He confronts Gen. Ford about the serum and learns about his involvement in the African village. Ford admits that he withheld the information on the virus due to national security: its potential of being turned into the perfect biological weapon for the U.S. Military. E-1101 worked on the monkey because it was infected with the original virus not the mutated airborne one, which means that the host monkey is carrying both strains of the virus.
Daniels then learns of Operation Clean Sweep, a plan by the U.S. military to destroy the town of Cedar Creek by bombing it, again using a fuel-air bomb, with approval from the president. Maj. Gen. Donald McClintock (Sutherland), who was Ford's partner in the African camp and the one responsible for its destruction, is discreetly planning to use the bombing of Cedar Creek to cover up the virus's existence to advance his secret weapon agenda and to prevent Daniels from finding a cure, McClintock has him placed under arrest by falsely implicating Daniels as the carrier of the virus. This leads Daniels and Major Salt (Gooding) on a frantic search to find the host animal to save the town, Casey, and Robby: flying by helicopter to the shipping location where the monkey was picked up, Daniels obtains and broadcasts on the news a picture of the host monkey, which a viewer realizes her daughter is playing with in their backyard. She calls the station and Daniels and Salt arrives at the family's house; he asks the daughter to coax out the monkey, which Salt shoots with a tranquilizer gun.
On the way back the two deal with McClintock (who had also come by helicopter to prevent them from returning to Cedar Creek), but Daniels has Salt fire a missile in the trees to trick McClintock with a decoy helicopter crash, and give them time to escape. Upon returning to Cedar Creek, Salt uses the monkey's antibodies with the E-1101 to create an anti-serum, in time to save Robby but not Casey, who succumbs to the virus. Meanwhile, Daniels discovers Operation Clean Sweep is in progress; aware that his superiors are covering up the virus, he takes it upon himself to fly in the way of the bomber to stop it. With support from Gen. Ford, Daniels is able stay in the way of the plane long enough to convince the pilot and his bombardier that vital information was deliberately withheld from them and the bombardier detonates the bomb over water and not the town. Ford, having had enough of McClintock's secret agenda, relieves him of command and then places McClintock under arrest for withholding vital information from the President. McClintock promises to take Ford down with him, a threat Ford ignores. Daniels makes up with his wife, and the remaining members of town are successfully treated for the Motaba virus.
Production
The film was shot at various locations in California and Hawaii. The locations used in California include Eureka, Ferndale, Los Angeles, and Pasadena. The lone spot used in Hawaii was Kauai, which was used to film some of the scenes that were supposed to be in Africa.
The film was inspired by a rival, never-produced virus outbreak movie, Crisis in the Hot Zone, an adaptation of Richard Preston's factual 1994 best-seller The Hot Zone. That adaptation and this project were in heated competition to get the right cast together and begin filming. "Crisis" had attachments from Robert Redford and Jodie Foster but they couldn't agree on the script, leading this film to get its cast and director together first and win the race to reach theatres in 1995.
The Biological-Chemical protective suits that the soldiers wore were actually real MOPP gear and not props. The masks were also real, known as the M17 Gas Mask. The suit that Hoffman wore is now displayed in the Planet Hollywood restaurant in the Disney Village section of Disneyland Resort Paris.
Awards and nominations
- ASCAP Award
- Top Box Office Film (Won)
- Best Science Fiction Film (Nominated)
- Cuba Gooding Jr. - Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Motion Picture (Nominated)
- Kevin Spacey - Best Supporting Actor (Won) - This nomination also included the film Swimming with Sharks, Se7en, and The Usual Suspects.
Box office
US Gross Domestic Takings: US$ 67,659,560
- + Other International Takings: $122,200,000
= Gross Worldwide Takings: $189,859,560
Cast
- Dustin Hoffman as Col. Sam Daniels
- Rene Russo as Robby Keough
- Morgan Freeman as Brig. Gen. Billy Ford
- Kevin Spacey as Casey Schuler
- Cuba Gooding Jr. as Maj. Salt
- Donald Sutherland as Maj. Gen. Donald McClintock
- Patrick Dempsey as Jimbo Scott
- Zakes Mokae as Dr. Benjamin Iwabi
- Malick Bowens as Dr. Raswani
- Susan Lee Hoffman as Dr. Lisa Aronson
- Benito Martinez as Dr. Julio Ruiz
- Bruce Jarchow as Dr. Mascelli
- Leland Hayward III as Henry Seward
- Daniel Chodos as Rudy Alvarez
- Dale Dye as Lt. Col. Briggs
- Johnny Kim as Seaman Chulso Lee
- Gina Menza as Mrs. Jeffries
- Per Didrik Fasmer as Mr. Jeffries
- Kara Keough as Kate Jeffries
- Katie as Betsy the infected White-fronted Capuchin monkey.
External links
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