Outbreak

You know a cold has taken it's hold when you are too lazy to get up and change the video or the DVD and just sit there flicking the remote til you come across something to placate your misery with. Such was the scene last night when despite the copious amounts of Contact-C night time and CSI Vegas marathon so I suppose it was apt I should stumble across OUTBREAK. This Wolfgang Petersen flop was considered by many at the time to be a hasty cash in on Richard Preston's blockbuster docunovel THE HOT ZONE. Hard to say why it was recieved so poorly as it's not a bad little film, yes, slightly contrived but you can only do so much with a topic like a hanta virus crisis in two hours. The star power is certainly there with Dustin Hoffman and Rene Russo being backed by the likes of Kevin Spacey, Cuba Gooding Jr. and Donald Sutherland. THe point about outbreak is it could happen and no doubt the military response to it would be quite similar to what is presented here. It looks as if it's running on HISTORY all month so you may wish to keep your eyes out for it.