Outbreak

The 1995 American medical disaster thriller directed by Wolfgang Petersen, written by Laurence Dworet and Robert Roy Pool, centers on the outbreak of a fictional Ebola-like virus called Motaba, which spreads from Africa to the small town of Cedar Creek, California. Colonel Sam Daniels (Dustin Hoffman), a virologist from the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases, investigates an outbreak in Zaire that annihilates a village. Despite his warnings, superiors dismiss the threat. The virus enters the U.S. via an infected capuchin monkey smuggled by technician Jimbo Scott (Patrick Dempsey). The virus mutates into an airborne strain, causing an epidemic in Cedar Creek. Daniels, alongside his ex-wife Dr. Roberta Keough (Rene Russo), Major Salt (Cuba Gooding Jr.), and others, strives to locate the host monkey to develop an antiserum. General McClintock (Donald Sutherland) plans to obliterate the town to conceal the virus's existence and preserve it as a bioweapon. With assistance from General Ford (Morgan Freeman), Daniels averts the bombing by finding the monkey and creating an antiserum, saving the town and exposing the conspiracy.