In a world where earth’s citizens start panicking about COVID-19, an old movie about a worldwide pandemic will rise.
The opening lines of a new movie trailer? Not quite. Rather, it’s the reality we’re living in: The 2011 Steven Soderbergh film “Contagion” has quickly become one of the most-downloaded movies on the internet — and for that, we can thank the novel coronavirus.
Recent articles by the New York Times, BuzzFeed News and the Verge have documented the film’s unlikely ascent in recent months, which closely coincides with major news reports about COVID-19. According to the Verge, which partnered with TorrentFreak to study how many torrent downloads “Contagion” received between Jan. 1 and March 4, four major spikes in downloads were each timed with a major news event about the coronavirus.
The Verge said “Contagion” has also entered the iTunes top 10 in countries such as Australia, and the top 20 in the United States.
According to BuzzFeed, the film wasn’t even in the top 100 prior to the coronavirus outbreak. The New York Times reports that at the end of December, Warner Bros. listed “Contagion” as its 270th most popular title — it has since jumped to second, behind the “Harry Potter” films.
Despite its newfound popularity, “Contagion” isn’t available on any of the major streaming services in the United States. The only place to legally stream it is through the Cinemax add-on, which is available through Hulu and Amazon Prime. Since Cinemax is considered a niche service, viewers have opted to just download “Contagion” instead.
“I paid $12.99 to watch a 10-year-old movie,” Barry Jenkins, the Oscar-winning director of “Moonlight,” told the New York Times. “I’ve never done that before.”
“I was really curious to see how well it would line up to what is happening right now,” he added. “It was shocking. It felt like I was watching a documentary that has all these movie stars playing real people.”
“The Rewatchables,” one of the most popular movie podcasts, even dropped a new episode about “Contagion” on Sunday.
It’s been almost a decade since “Contagion” hit theaters, but the movie is spreading like, well, a virus.