Disease In Contagion

Matt Damon in the movie Contagion plays Mitch Emhoff, a man whose wife, Beth Emhoff, dies suddenly after returning to the United States from China. As well as his wife, his stepson passes away from the same disease. His character in the movie initially reacts as if it was just the common cold or any of the seasonal sickness. As the movie moves along you can see his feelings toward the disease change. This is the common theme of the movie, as everyone seems to down play the severity of the vastly spreading disease in the start of the outbreak. At first sight of his ill wife Mitch assumes she just has the common cold or any other common illness. He shows his lack of concern for the severity of the disease when his stepson Clark comes down

This is the first pre-cautious step that we get to see Mitch take as far as being concerned about the disease. He then runs to stop his daughter from opening the door to her friend Andrew, who comes by to give them flowers and his condolences about the loss of his wife and stepson. As Mitch and his daughter try to flee town they go by a grocery store you see Mitch become very cautious of everything he and his daughter touch, telling her to not touch anything and to get rid of her gloves as soon as they leave the store. Immediately after they get out of the store he covers her hands in germ-x trying to prevent any disease she may be able to catch. Throughout Contagion viewers get to see a very realistic swing in Matt Damon’s character Mitch as he goes from your typical guy thinking nothing of the new disease to a much more scared man trying to find every way possible to keep his daughter safe from the rapid growing disease. At first probably over looking simple sanitary things such as just washing his hands to physically keeping soap in his pocket for him and his daughter. Basically closing off his daughter’s world from everything that could possibly harm