You’re the girl holding a boy’s hand for the first time; you’re pushed past a feverish man on the bus; you’re sitting across from the annoying girl coughing oh-so-loudly in the library. In Contagion, a film exploring the effects of a biological pandemic, any of these activities are enough to pass on the lethal disease, and so leave the viewer shuffling on the edge of their seat, nervously edging away from the hand of the person next to them.

Contagion is a fast-paced thriller. Within minutes (in a Scream-style twist), one of the main names attached to the project has been terminated. From that point onwards havoc ensues, as a lavish host of Hollywood names correspond across the globe, from Marion Cotillard as the doctor from the World Health Organization in Switzerland, to Matt Damon as the widower in Minnesota. These interlinking stories are certainly not baffling, and various scenes illustrate a harsh portrayal of the realities of a global outbreak as Soderburgh manages to restrain itself from presenting the formulaic images of the President being deported and a hero who finds the vaccine and immediately saves all.

The film capably balances the search for a cure with the effects of the mass devastation incurred from such a catastrophe. Soderburgh also ingeniously uses global settings to probe the tenuous political organizations in place for such an event.

The vast plethora of popular actors on offer would imply that the acting would be top notch. Unfortunately, however, they are all distinctly boring. On further thought, each actor simply plays themselves: Jude Law is obnoxious and exasperating; Gwyneth Paltrow is flimsy and flirtatious; Kate Winslet is ballsy and heartbreaking. The storylines are straightforward, and in an attempt to utilise all the famous names, a fair few are gratuitous, including a frankly bizarre turn of events which leads to Cotillard’s abduction by a Chinese villager.

Contagion is let down by the inessential storylines, melodramatic dialogue, and insipid actors. Rather than an alternative, courageous look at the threat of an epidemic to human civilisation, it is merely a fairly impressive advert for antibacterial hand-wash.