Smallpox 2002

Smallpox 2002: Silent Weapon is a fictional docudrama produced by Wall to Wall, showing how a single act of bioterrorism leads to terrifying consequences globally.

Smallpox 2002
Also known asSmallpox 2002: Silent Weapon
GenreDocudrama
Written by
Directed byDaniel Percival
Starring
Narrated byBrian Cox
ComposerAndy Price
Country of originUnited Kingdom
Original languageEnglish
Production
Executive producerJonathan Hewes
ProducerSimon Chinn
Running time90 minutes
Release
Original networkBBC Two
Original release5 February 2002 (2002-02-05)

Background

The premise of it was one man who, in 2002, creates the smallpox virus himself, infects himself, and touches ten people in New York City. This eventually leads to a pandemic across the world that is later defeated, but not before 60 million people are killed.

The film was commissioned before the September 11 attacks and is presented in the form of a fictional documentary, including false interviews and stock footage. The tagline for the movie was, "Drama, until it happens".

Reception

Newspaper reviews of the documentary were mixed, varying from "a sick stunt" to "extraordinarily good".[1] The docudrama proved very popular with viewers, attracting 3.4m viewers, 15% of the audience, to a 9:00pm slot on BBC2 according to overnight returns.[2]

Notes
  • The film was renamed Smallpox when it aired on FX on 2 January 2005.

References
  1. Smallpox 2002 – Silent Weapon round up of newspaper reviews, in The Guardian, 6 February 2002
  2. Smallpox proves infectious for BBC2, The Guardian, 6 February 2002
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