Theo Robertson VIRUS is a film I first saw in the early 1980s and didn't think too much of it at the time . Much of my discontent was down to the fact that the ensemble cast just seemed a little too ensemble - there's no real character that the story tries to focus on . Indeed this makes the story feel somewhat mechanical from a narrative point of view . When someone turns up to explain plot turns they disappear quickly never to be seen again . Recently I found out that I had seen the American 108 minute version rather than 156 minute original cut but I can't help thinking perhaps the 156minute cut would make things any more coherent Perhaps the problem lies in that post apocalypse fiction isn't best suited to the cinema screen . One can't help thinking its perfect medium is either literature or mini-series . NO BLADE OF GRASS would have benefited greatly from being a 4 hour mini-series rather than a disjointed 90 minute film and breaking up VIRUS in to an episodic series would have helped its story telling too From the outset we're treated to some obvious and ridiculous exposition involving the MM88 virus where characters go in to details about things they must surely know or don't need to know . At any second you expect a character to reply " But we're commie agents trying to steal a biological warfare weapon not characters in a film so please STFU " In fact when they get on a plane with the stolen virus they spend so much time talking they don't notice the mountain in front of them thereby setting up an inciting incident at its most painfully obvious . The film that becomes clichéd as people in power - in this case the staff at The White House - watch on television as the world succumbs to " The Italian flu " which is in reality the MM88 . If that's not bad enough an insane General primes America's nuclear deterrent to take out the Soviet Union just in case they decide to launch a nuclear attack " But if the world has been wiped out by the Italian flu why would anyone bother priming nuclear weapons ? " Yes but that's to do with a later contrived plot turn where survivors in the Antartic are safe from the virus since it can't reproduce in sub zero temperatures . That and the fact it's a Japanese film and we all know how the Japanese feel about nuclear missiles especially when they're being pointed by Americans Actually this is the confusing bit . If the survivors are confined to the south pole surely they'll become extinct anyway ? After all it'd be impossible to become self sufficient , you'd be unable to grow crops etc . Perhaps that's why Antartica has no indigenous population ? There's nothing to indicate that the Italian flu will die out so mankind is doomed anyway even without an imminent nuclear strike This condemns the film which is a great pity because in parts it's compelling enough for people interested in speculative fiction . The idea of a myngonist relationship is a thing of the distant pass in this new society is touched upon but like so many other ideas in VIRUS is quickly skated over and then forgotten about

spiderturd get original version.or you can watch it online at stagevu type in Virus aka Day Of Resurrection 1980.the USA version sucks balls chop up a good movie cause they can.i seen USA verson when i was 12 liked it but i could tell stuff was cut out lastnite finally seen the original version and it was a lot better. all movies i own are original uncut any movie i watch is uncut i don't watch todays crap movies or their remakes.A military-engineered virus, released during a plane crash, kills the entire human population. The only survivors are scientists in Antarctica, who desperately try to find a cure and save what is left of the planet from further destruction.

MetalGeek I came across "Virus" on DVD at the dollar store recently, and though I'd never heard of it, a quick look at IMDb revealed that the film had a pretty decent rating so I risked a buck on it. I loved disaster films when I was a kid so I'm surprised this one slipped past my radar back then. After further research I learned that there are several different cuts of this movie available and that the DVD I purchased is in fact the shorter U.S. cut, which is missing almost an hour of footage (mainly featuring the Japanese characters and their back stories). Despite that, I still found "Virus" to be a pretty entertaining (if a bit depressing) film and I'm interested in tracking down a copy of the "true" version of the film.Apparently "Virus" was the most expensive film made by a Japanese company at the time of its release (1980), featuring a large cast of both Japanese and Western actors. Unfortunately it never got proper worldwide distribution and was a major financial failure, which is a shame because this was a pretty damn good flick, even in this truncated version. The American cast (who are featured more prominently in the cut I saw) are all genre stalwarts who appeared in a lot of similar disaster films around this same time period -- Glenn Ford as the President of the United States, Robert Vaughn as his Senatorial foil, Henry Silva as a crazed Army general, and so on. I was particularly tickled by the total mis-casting of Chuck "Rifleman" Connors as the captain of a British submarine, because he doesn't even try to affect a British accent. (Perhaps the Japanese producers figured "Screw it, we're just going to dub over him with a Japanese actor anyway.") It does tend to be a bit talky, could've used some more action scenes, and obviously its Cold War era politics are now out of date, but overall "Virus" was a pretty decent little end-of-the-world/apocalypse saga.As the movie opens, some cloak-and-dagger types meet in an East German hideaway and exchange a vial of a new biological weapon known as MM-88. The plane carrying the men away from the exchange point crashes in the mountains and the virus is freed, causing a worldwide epidemic of disease that all but wipes out humanity from planet Earth. The only survivors untouched by the disease are a small group of researchers and military types stationed in Antarctica, where the virus cannot spread due to the cold temperatures. These 800-and-change survivors find themselves not only faced with the prospect of repopulating the barren Earth (with only 8 women in the population!), but also preventing yet another catastrophe, because in the final days before the fall of the U.S. Silva's character had armed a missile defense system which pointed all of America's nukes at Russia. An earthquake in the region threatens to cause the defense system to activate, which would then result in a retaliatory strike from a similar defense system on the Russian side. So just as our group of survivors is getting used to the idea of living in this Brave New World, now they have to worry about a follow up apocalypse! An American soldier (Bo Svenson of "Walking Tall" fame) and a Japanese scientist are dispatched to the ruins of Washington, D.C. to de-activate the missile system before all Hell breaks loose on Earth (again). I will not violate the Spoiler Warning rules by telling you how it all turns out, but let's just say it's not the typical Hollywood outcome."All-star cast spectaculars" like these were a dime a dozen in the late 70s and early 80s and a lot of them stunk. "Virus" doesn't. It's a shame that such an ambitious project went all but unnoticed on this side of the ocean at the time of its release. Now that the U.S. version is apparently in the Public Domain and is readily available at an affordable price, it's worth taking a look at a film that had more to say than your average disaster flick. "Virus" is one of my better Dollar Store DVD pickups of late, and one of the few that I'm likely to watch again in the future. Now, where do I find a copy of the "true" original cut of this film? Time to do some searching.

Joseph Sylvers The best disaster movie you will never see. If you can get the Japanese cut, it has almost an extra hour, which I imagine probably gave a lot more depth to the film, just a guess. The American version I did get my hands on was pretty good on it's own....(read more) This is not really a movie about saving the world so much as surviving the numerous apocalypses the world can throw at you, even after the entire world population dies at the hands of a super virus, those surviving in Artic research stations(the virus cannot survive the cold) some 8880 men and 8 women(the scene where the women address how 1 on 1 "relationships" are going to be impossible, is one of the most genuine, poignant, and unique in the film, the Apocalypse doesn't hit home till you realize there's 8000 horny scientists, crawling over each other to play Adam and eve, those not-if-you-were- the-last-man-on-earth scenarios horribly reversed.), still have to deal with the fact that both the Russian and American automatic nuclear missile systems are still in operation, and a coming earthquake is liable to force them to launch, one of which is pointed at the Antartic research station. So two men on foot, one Japanese and one American take a trip to DC, to turn off the machine. A lot of the save the world stuff takes place in the last 20 minutes, the rest is all death and survival.This was at the time of it's release the most expensive Japanese film ever made, and it shows, as we get scenes from Germany, Japan, America, and yes the Antartic, real submarines too. If you sat through "Outbreak", "The Day After Tomorrow", and many of the now numerous end of the world films, this wont be anything too new, there are some scenes which are undeniably cheesy(the "walk" at the end).However, because I've got a U.S. cut, and U.S. cuts, as a rule of thumb, are generally dumbed down and streamlined, sad but true. So I don't know how to give an accurate review, this movie as it is at the 108 minutes I saw it, was decent with a fair serving of 80's cheese, I have a feeling though with a little more time, this might have felt as epic and grand as it intimates in it's best moments. "Virus" is also a terrible title for this film as well, which has little to do with virus', or bacteriology, it's a good global destruction movie, "The End" is a much better fitting moniker. Director would go on to later success with "Battle Royale".Note: I picked this movie up because it get's referenced a lot in Junot Diaz's "The Brief And Wonderous Life Of Oscar Wao" as the title characters favorite film, and in the right context I can see why.