Scientists in Antarctica desperately try to find a cure to a military virus that was released in a plane crash and has wiped out the rest of the world.
Apocalypse - Das Ende der Welt, Apokalypse - Das Ende der Welt, Tödlicher Virus, Fukkatsu no hi, Day of Resurrection, The End
Japan 
France 
Norway 
Germany16 France Germany Japan Norway 
You: Contagion
Me, an intellectual:
Action! - The Way of the Yakuza: The Turbulent Battles of Fukasaku
Kinji keeps exploring other uncharted territories this time, not only diving deeper into the “killing virus” craze that was popping around at that time but also some submarine thrillers in what’s probably his only proper English movie. We got some Japanese here and there, but for the most part, the entire cast speaks English, and for the most part, I’d say they are good. It helps that he has a wonderful cast, from Edward James Olmos to George Kennedy, Bo Svenson, Olivia Hussey, Masao Kusaki, and, of course, Sonny Chiba. Kusaki is probably one of the highlights, as he does a very good job, especially at the end,…
'The United States had no monopoly on idiots'
Gorgeous visuals, effects, crowd staging and soundtrack in such a bleak tale that embraces almost every major disaster in a single film.
Rare case where a director has foreign actors be much better than his local countrymen who were quite comically melodramatic at times.
All that meandering gets a little out there but that final odyssey in the last 10 minutes was transcendent.
i ended up really liking this, even if it doesn’t quite become the movie it could be. there are moments where it feels genuinely bleak and gripping, especially toward the end, and that apocalyptic tone really lands. even with a stacked cast, masao kusakari’s character is the one that really sticks out which grounds the chaos with something more human. i just wish more of the film carried that same intensity instead of drifting into slower stretches that feel less urgent. when it locks in, it’s great, and you can see the stronger version hiding inside it.
This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.
Steven Soderbergh's CONTAGION seems to be everyone's go-to Coronavirus party movie, especially with Typhoid Gwyneth in the news with her vagina-scented candles, but for those of us in the know, future BATTLE ROYALE director Kinji Fukasaku's 1980 cult classic VIRUS is where it's at. A disaster movie so epic that it destroys the world *twice*--first with a pandemic that wipes out everyone on the planet except 855 men and eight women on Antarctica, and then with an accidental nuclear holocaust when an earthquake triggers the US launch system--VIRUS was the most expensive Japanese film ever made at the time of its release. Unfortunately, nobody in America knew about it because it was cut to shreds from 156 minutes to 108,…
One of the more interesting outbreak films I’ve seen. Very pretty cinematography, I’d love to know where they filmed all the Antarctica scenes. I enjoyed the downfall of society, and how the people stationed on Antarctica made a life from what was left. The film started to falter about a third of the way through, losing my interest slightly, but the sequence in Washington was quite fun.
“Life is wonderful.”
I wanted to watch “Virus” for a long time. The most expensive Japanese movie of its time featuring an impressive international “who’s who” cast of familiar faces. It’s a very well-made and shot movie with an impressively large scope. And needless tho say, the story about a killer virus wiping out almost all of humanity hits even harder post COVID.
Sure, the original Japanese cut running 156 minutes is a little long and in danger of losing momentum at times. But overall I was quite engaged in the story and characters. The colorful cast and great production values made this a worthwhile experience. It’s probably not a movie I would watch regularly, but I’m glad I’ve finally seen it. Recommended for people with a bit of patience.
PS: Sonny Chiba, who has a small part in the film, actually died of COVID-19 in 2021. A bitter irony considering the films subject matter.
Hooptober X: Ten-Tastic Terror 👻
Film 11/31
Decade: 1980
2/2 post apocalyptic or natural disaster related film
"Life is wonderful."
Well, hi there.
Today's Unity Day here so I figured it's perfect to watch the longest film on my Hooptober list and with a whopping 156 minutes it's Virus, on Tubi declared as the director's cut, I've been told not to bother with the 'American' cut, as it basically butchered the movie with approximately 100 minutes remaining.
In 1982 humanity has been wiped out - except 863 people on Antarctica. The remaining scientists desperately try to find a cure to the virus.
This was one of my most anticipated movies on my list, many people seem to adore this movie…
An anxious global nightmare stretched across ice and silence. In a post-pandemic world, Virus still manages to convey a hauntingly beautiful quality and a deep, humanitarian sense of the tragic, capitalising upon the conjecture that the one thing that unites the world is our mutual fear of imminent annihilation. Of all the adaptations of Sakyo Komatsu's works, this one is undoubtedly the best. It never feels exploitative, moving between political chambers, military bases and frozen wastelands with a fierce intensity. Director Kinji Fukasaku gives the whole film a relentlessly sombre edge, never compromising his usual style in an attempt to appeal to a more mass market. There’s a melancholy humanity underneath the procedural detail and geopolitical anxiety. The survivors are…
Kinji Fukasaku anarchic desire to blow up every society institution goes to its logical end: mankind extinction (and as far as apocalyptical scenarios go, 800 people bunkered up in Antarctica while George Kennedy runs things is very much the end). Fukasaku leisured pace (156 minutes) gives the film plenty of time to pile up details about societal breakdown both in the first hour describing the virus outbreak and the second when the Antarctica survivors try to pick things up. His good descriptive eye goes side by side with the elegiac quality of the imagery which manages to suggest a sorrowful finite quality that set it apart from similar apocalyptical films. Some scenes here are dramatic wooden with men going on…
“Any student of history can tell you that a rational mind is not always a prerequisite for a position of power.”
There’s no way I thought this was gonna be over 2 1/2 hours. Make time for this to get the most out of it. There’s also multiple versions. The original Japanese theatrical cut, which is 156 minutes, is interestingly still mostly in English but with Japanese credits and lots of foreign dialogue. The US cut is edited to all fuck down to 108 min, apparently removing most the Japanese centric narrative. Tubi have both, but the original cut doesn’t have any subs so I recommend checking it out on the internet archives under ‘Virus AKA Day of Resurrection (1980)’…
Sakyo "Japan Sinks" Komatsu's novel about the aftermath of a devastating plague gets a large ensemble cast to ride the tail end of the disaster genre's heyday into a pretty substantial box office bomb...
I caught this back in 2017, when my reviews on here were far less generous/thoughtful/kind - so that is an honest take. The verdict then? Talking head exposition dumps destroy the pace, a language barrier between cast and crew lead to wildly inconsistent performances by the non-stars, and there are no real stakes for survivors - removing any tension normally found in the genre. All fair.
Rewatched with the fine folks of the collab... last night I decided to catch the 108 minute cut that excised…
