The Viral Factor (2012)
International Security Affairs agent Jon is on a dangerous mission to escort a criminal scientist to another country. En route, a member of his team turns out to be a traitor and shoots Jon in the head while kidnapping the scientist. When Jon wakes up in the hospital, a doctor tells him that within weeks, the bullet in his brain will cause complete paralysis. Jon returns to Beijing to see his mother, who confesses that Jon has a brother in Malaysia who was raised by his father, a gambler. Jon takes a flight to Malaysia to find his brother, Yeung. On the plane he forms a bond with Dr. Kan, who promises to look into possible treatments for his condition. However, when they arrive, Yeung tries to kidnap the doctor and when Jon intervenes, he's also taken hostage. The two soon realize they're brothers, and decide to work together in order to keep the criminals behind the kidnappings from reinfecting the world of a disease long thought cured.
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Absolutely the worst movie.
In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.
At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.
The plot isn't so bad, but the pace of storytelling is too slow which makes people bored. Certain moments are so obvious and unnecessary for the main plot. I would've fast-forwarded those moments if it was an online streaming. The ending looks like implying a sequel, not sure if this movie will get one
"The Viral Factor" is an OK, fun enough action movie, but one that suffers from an overlong running time and family issues.We have agent Jon, who gets shot in the head by Sean, who has betrayed him, just to wake up and discover his mother took him and left behind an older brother and his father. An older brother that is a thief and is, what the chances, working for Sean, as this brother's mission is to kidnap a scientist and get a virus out of a top-security building. Of course the two brothers get a chance to fight against each other before they discover they are related. And then...Well, let the viewer be surprised by what the movie has to offer. Which is quite a lot, as things keep happening non-stop for over two hours. Do they make sense? Not much, but they keep happening.As we have it, "The Viral Factor" keeps the viewer engaged, and even if it becomes a little boring in the end, it is passable enough as an action movie. The acting is acceptable, Dante Lam has good action directing skills and we have a little bit of everything from races, hand on hand fight, to shootings (we suffer here of another case of immortal characters, who can get shot a thousand times and fall from the top of a 60-store building and keep running as if nothing had happened; OK, I am exaggerating a tiny little bit).It could be way better, but if we don't ask for much, it is a fun time.
Who said an action movie needs a story at all. Just throw in some martial experts, some guns, one or two big villains, a few good cops a few corrupt ones, and don't forget some innocent bystanders - every thing will work out on its own. It almost does, the action moves so fast you don't have the time to stop and realize nothing made sense here. While watching I simply had a vague awkward feeling but once the movie ended and I tried to figure out what I was seeing it really downed on me. It was simply a flimsy excuse for a script. Our hero might be looking for the tiniest needle in a huge haystack, never fear, fate will throw it right in front of his feet before he even starts searching. Coincidents are not things that happen every now and again, it's the way Dante Lam's universe operate, it's the solution for every problem that might hold the pace of his movie an extra second. So the action scenes do work, the melodrama is exactly as one would expect, but if you really want to enjoy this one don't stop to think about it.
well, 3 stars is for the nice action stunt carried out seamlessly. 7 stars minus is for the lousy casting job and the moronic screenplay that messed up the whole nine yards. here are the problems:1) if the small pox bio-virus so important, why use ground transportation instead of air lift? 2) why the scene is originated from Jordain? Jordain is not war-torn country, it's Iraq, stupid. 3) a bullet resided in the brain where is non-operable and the nerve center would be totally messed up within 2 weeks, after the guy stayed in the hospital for 3 months, and the guy was able to walk out the jordanian hospital, went back to china. well, that journey would have wasted how many days? the math was somewhat confusing a lot, dude. 4) if the young son (the one who carried a bullet in his brain) was brought up by his mother, why his mandarin pu-tong-wha with an Taiwanese accent? if the mother's hometown was Beijing, why her accent was without any Beijing tone? 4) so the younger brother was a police, what country's police force he belonged to? 5) then again, same problem happened again. the female bio-chem doctor spoken a common mandarin pu-tong-wha, her mother spoke typical Cantonese. why her daughter could speak the mandarin Chinese pu-tong-wha without any Cantonese dialect accent? no Cantonese could speak mandarin without any localized Cantonese accent. absolutely impossible! 6) so the brother was a dangerous criminal, in Malaysia? so, the father had migrated from Beijing(?) or hongkong(?) or canton (?) to Malaysia? the elder son became a local criminal. and the younger brother would be so accidentally got involved in his caper right after he landed in the twin-tower city? how convenient, dude. this is a movie typically treated viewers as brainless morons without any reasoning logic. but after all the criticism been said, lets sit back and enjoy the nicely shot exotic locations this movie's lens carried around and also try to appreciate the well managed stunts and special effect of the fighting scenes, the flying bullets, the nicely done explosions, the car jack and so on.this is an action movie full of heavily flawed scenarios and plot twists, some way too shallow, some way over the top. strongly recommend to watch but you must turn off your i.q. reasoning function first.
This is another typical action movie from HK that will be loved by those who watch with their right-sided brain but not those with left-sided brain. Better still if watch without working on the brains.Anyway, you have no time for the brain. Scenes are fast, action start right from the beginning till end, mostly well filmed, fast paced but the whole story, main plots and sub-plots right to the action details are full of multi-layered coincidental happenings or actions and events all in the nick time that the audience will find it unconvincing and unbelievable. If only they have paid more attention to the script instead of the action. Revealing the characters or more of the story will spoil the fun, there are also too many loose ends. One important role's mum actually got lost in the middle of the action. Most of the acting are good except for Jay Chou who look lost throughout the movie but it's OK considering his "problem". The location of KL(Kuala Lumpur) made the movie better; instead of usual HK.