By GREG DIXON
As you read this, I'm digging a survival shelter.
Under the old plum tree out back is probably best, I figure, though expecting the shovel to carve a decent trench into the rocky volcanic soil around my place is probably something of an ask.
But that's not going to
stop me, not after seeing Smallpox 2002: The Silent Weapon last night on Prime.
Given the current state of the world - Dubya versus Saddam, Dubya versus North Korea, Dubya versus world-wide terrorism, Wacko Jacko versus a witch-hunt - my own current state hasn't exactly been one of serene inner peace.
So this dramatised documentary of a fictional smallpox attack on New York last April - an attack we were told killed 60 million people worldwide - made me ever-so-slightly ill with a bout of paranoia.
It was clever if frightening stuff, all right. Particularly if you - like I - hadn't bothered to check what you were about to watch and spent the first couple of minutes thinking, how the hell did I miss this?
This sort of thing has a bit of tradition, starting with Orson Welles' The War Of The Worlds and the mass panic that caused when it was broadcast to an unsuspecting radio audience in the 1930s.
But when the 12-tonne penny finally dropped last night, there was little comfort to be had.
Over two hours, this BBC-Granada co-production laid out, with an undeniable logic, how the real thing would play out.
It would take time to work out what was ailing the first victim because smallpox was wiped out in 1980 after a massive 20-year vaccination programme and few doctors these days would instantly recognise its hellish symptoms.
By the time the disease had been identified, it would already be too late. The airborne virus - a virulent strain that a mystery terrorist had probably obtained from a former Soviet bio-weapons scientist - would in a few days spread exponentially through New York, the US and, thanks to modern air transportation, the world.
The authorities would panic - too few vaccination doses for the world population. The disease would become pandemic, societies would start to break down, martial law would be declared, millions would die. Eventually the outbreak would be brought under control - but only in the rich, vaccinated West.
Silent Weapon's drama was nicely constructed. There were the experts explaining what had happened and why, including the mistakes, the finger-pointing I-told-you-sos and the accusations that poor Black Americans had been last to be targeted for vaccination.
There were the first-person stories of families who lost spouses and children and the FBI bungles.
If Silent Weapon did overplay its hand, it was with the too-spooky music and chapter titles like "The Body". As well, there were a few too many wooden performances.
But its realism, its warning, was only too real - so much so that even Dubya reportedly asked to see it.
Which I'm sure he didn't do with Sins Of The Flesh (9.30pm, Tuesdays, Prime). However this three-part documentary on the porn industry is actually more interesting - and not nearly as tacky - as you might think.
The first episode on porn stars played out like a entertaining pulp fiction with its drugs, crimes and, of course, sleaze. And how many documentaries boast a source called "Legs McNeil"?
If that's a little too Jerry Springer for you, well Prime appears to have plenty more serious documentaries coming up in what looks like a minor return to the old Prime.
They include Sir David Attenborough's latest natural history opus, The Life Of Mammals, airing soonish, and Life On Air, a retrospective of Attenborough's 50 years of natural history work, presented by Michael Palin.
If they keep this up, I might have to move the telly into my new shelter.
Story archives:
Links: Bioterrorism
Timeline: Major events since the Sept 11 attacks
By GREG DIXON
As you read this, I'm digging a survival shelter.
Under the old plum tree out back is probably best, I figure, though expecting the shovel to carve a decent trench into the rocky volcanic soil around my place is probably something of an ask.
But that's not going to
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