"Contagion"

Richard's Review: 2 1/2 stars

If "Jaws" kept people out of the water, "Contagion," the new film from "Erin Brockovich" director Steven Soderbergh, will keep them from touching their faces. The average person touches their face upwards of 3,000 times a day, and in the world of "Contagion" everything that comes in contact with your skin -- an elevator button, a glass at an airport, a handrail on a ferry -- could be fatal.

Set in the present day in far flung locations ranging from Hong Kong to London to Minneapolis with several stops in between, the story begins with patient zero, Beth Emhoff (Gwyneth Paltrow), an executive on business in Hong Kong. En route to Minneapolis, when she lives with her husband (Matt Damon) and young son she develops a fever and a cough. Twenty-four hours later she is dead and a modern day plague has begun.

The mutating disease spreads rapidly despite the best efforts of medical emergency personnel and Center for Disease Control and Prevention scientists (Marion Cotillard, Laurence Fishburne and Kate Winslet). Add in a meddlesome blogger (Jude Law) and widespread panic and you have SARS, Soderbergh style.

"Contagion" is "The Towering Inferno" with germs, an all-star disaster movie in the mode of Irwin Allen's 1970s spectacles. It's a generally more serious affair than the Allen cheesefest but they both beat with the same pulpy heart. Each movie takes itself a bit too seriously -- although the scene which gives new meaning to the phrase, "picking Gwyneth Paltrow's brain," seems geared for gruesome laughs -- has too many characters and tries with varying levels of success to pluck at your heartstrings.

"Contagion" suffers from an international story that stretches the narrative almost to its breaking point. Plot shards come and go and while it is easy to keep track of what's going on, they don't all feel necessary. A plot line featuring Marin Cotillard in China could easily have been removed with no noticeable (except for the absence of the lovely Ms. Cotillard) effect, and the blogger story feels forced.

Other than that "Contagion" is an effective medical procedural. It's a bit clinical at times, like an episode of "CSI" set entirely inside the lab, but in the light of SARS, H1N1 and West Nile it's a chilling movie premise.

It'll make you want to go home and hug someone you love... Just remember to wash your hands first.

"Warrior"

Richard's Review: 3 1/2 stars

"Rocky," the classic Sly Stalone movie set the template for many underdog sports movies that followed. How can you improve on the story? Add another Rocky! In the new MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) inspired film "Warrior" there's two! Two Rocky's in one!

The story involves a pair of brothers, Tom and Brendan (Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton), on very different paths in life which lead them to the same place -- an MMA cage match. Tom is a broken man, an Iraq war vet and former champion wrestler who returns home to see his father for the first time in 14 years. Brendan, like so many people, is a victim of the recession. A former UFC fighter and current high school physics teacher, he's three months away from foreclosure on his family home. Both men look to a grand prix, winner take all, knock down called Sparta, the War on the Shore in Atlantic City to solve their problems.

"Warrior" is a good mix of drama and action. Much time is spent establishing the back stories of the characters and while some of the plot machinations leading up to the final fisticuffs are a bit melodramatic, by the time the beating begins the audience is invested in both main characters.

Edgerton, an Australian actor best known on these shores for playing armed robber Barry 'Baz' Brown in "Animal Kingdom," hands in a heartfelt performance as a man who will do anything for his family, and Nick Nolte brings some believable grit to the role of the newly sober father. But it is "Inception" star Tom Hardy's brooding turn as a tortured soul battling demons, both internal and external, which steals the show. He's a menacing mass of muscle-bound machismo that makes other tough guys like Vin Diesel look like your Aunt Mary. He's intense.

So, go to "Warrior" for the acting and stay for the brutal finale, an MMA fight that spares no graphic detail. Punches are thrown, torsos pummeled and old wounds are healed. It's a surprisingly emotional climax to a macho movie.