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Outbreak (1995)
Rate:
5
Viewed:
1/17
1/17:
Outbreak is a mix of good and bad.
The virus outbreak and the biological warfare are the most fascinating aspects. They remind me of a book called
The Hot Zone which was written by Richard Preston. In fact, some of the stuff used in the film were
borrowed from it.
Unfortunately, the rest of the show is mostly mumbo jumbo about the dangers of military interference and its
interest in developing bio-weapons. That's so old and tired. If it can be cut out and the first part is focused
on more, Outbreak will become a much better film .
Speaking of crazy, who can believe a helicopter is capable of going from a faraway town to San Francisco and then
to a ship in the Pacific Ocean and back to the city before returning to the original town? A single tank lasts
between 200 and 300 miles. I doubt the guys will know where to fill up because the fuel has to be specialized.
Honestly, I'll never take off the mask anytime whenever the virus hits a town. How the characters did it several
times is plain careless. They should've been immediately infected. Of course, the U.S.'s message to anything
that serious is to bomb the hell out of it and to sweep the whole thing under the rug. It's very nice stuff.
Like I will believe, the monkey is easily captured after being set loose in the woods somewhere in California,
and the army guys manage to grab ahold of it just in time. By the way, capuchin monkeys don't come from Africa
but Central and South America. On the other hand, not everybody watches the news; hence, the woman who happened
to see the special bulletin report at the right time is pure bullshit.
Dustin Hoffman does a credible job, and Cuba Gooding, Jr., isn't bad, either. Kevin Spacey and Morgan Freeman are
okay, but Donald Sutherland is typecast and thus shouldn't be in the film. The worst part is Rene Russo. She's
annoying and a terrible actress. Of course, her character was going to survive after being infected with the
Motaba virus. In fact, I wanted her to suffer first and then die horribly.
All in all, Outbreak had a workable idea going, but everybody managed to screw it up by adding a lot
of unnecessary stuff.