
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 11, 1995                   TAG: 9503160011
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 12   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MIKE MAYO CORRESPONDENT
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

`OUTBREAK'S' SUSPENSE IS INFECTIOUS

"Outbreak" is a timely medical thriller that begins with a strong premise. It loses credibility about midway through, but by then the story is in overdrive and holds audience interest on the most basic what's-going-to-happen-next? level.

A prologue set in 1967 introduces the "Motaba" virus in a remote village in Zaire. American Army doctors manage to "contain" the virus with ruthless efficiency. When it reappears in the present, Col. Sam Daniels M.D. (Dustin Hoffman) is sent to Africa to study the bug. Accompanying him are Major Schuler (Kevin Spacey) and Major Salt (Cuba Gooding Jr.). When they return, their boss, Gen. Ford (Morgan Freeman), takes them off the Motaba project without explanation.

He says there is no reason to think it will reach this country, but Daniels contacts his ex-wife, Dr. Keough (Rene Russo), at the Center for Disease Control, and tells her about it.

At the same time, a monkey carrying the virus has arrived aboard a ship in San Francisco.

For the first hour or so, director Wolfgang Petersen, writers Laurence Dworet and Robert Roy Pool, and cinematographer Michael Ballhaus follow the complex and compelling trail of the virus as it moves in several directions. That part of the film is fast-paced and visually dazzling with some astonishing camerawork.

The tone and pace change when the military doctors think they've isolated the virus in a California coastal town. Then the action tends to focus on the more conventional details of quarantine - helicopters, Hum-vees and machine guns - under the command of the evil Gen. McClintock (Donald Sutherland).

Even if this role is a bit thin compared to some of his films, Dustin Hoffman brings his usual intensity to it. Particularly toward the end, when plausibility is stretched well past the breaking point, he's able to make his character believable. And his "chemistry" with co-stars Cuba Gooding Jr. and Rene Russo adds the human element the film needs.

Any contemporary story dealing with serious viruses is going to contain references and allusions to AIDS and HIV. Here those are understated and touching. And even when the action on screen seems completely far-fetched and outlandish, the reality of viral infections - as described in such recent books as "The Coming Plague" and "The Hot Zone," about a recent laboratory emergency in Virginia - is far too immediate.

But it would be misleading to load too much serious baggage on this kind of escapism. "Outbreak" is a finely crafted thriller, one that delivers all the suspense it promises.

Outbreak

***

A Warner Bros. release playing at the Tanglewood Mall and Salem Valley 8. 123 min. Rated R for subject matter, strong language, some violence.

by CNB