Virus X (2010)

Purely Joyful Movie!

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Unshakable, witty and deeply felt, the film will be paying emotional dividends for a long, long time.

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

I did thoroughly enjoyed this modest scripted, but well shot, and presented sci-fi thriller : it was fun to watch without too many false pretenses. I read some of those earlier reviews on here: some should be reported . It's (especially in a couple of those above) so obvious that they haven't even given to this well produced effort a chance, but just watched it with judgmental disdain, and a personal hate so obvious that truly gets offensive . Those are what I call trolls, since if you (even would take the time) to just check them out they have a profile that's only reviewed this film, and, in ways that are unbearably silly, and should not be permitted by such a serious site like IMDb. That being said, it is not Academy Award's material, but, I believe someone with a little brain, and class would have figured it out at the premise. It's an average campy, suggestive, and standard sci-fi movie that is as derivative as thousand of others films that have been already made many times before but without deserving such offensive, ludicrous tones: guess one can only pity folks killing themselves with their own self admitted, widely demonstrative ignorance. I can only tell you that I was certainly not expecting much at all, and, that actually a friend almost had to force me to watch this. But, then, I was quickly pleasantly surprised and hooked into it by the slick cinematography, the special effects, the incredible music score composed by Shawn Klement, the good special effects, and over all accurate make up supervision. Sound design was also first class, and, if the script was trite, the direction was very promising, extremely professional, and, obviously savvy focused onto fighting sets that were "arranged" to cover up for some warehouse, or cheap sound stage's labyrinthine claustrophobic sensation and lack of better props. But, thankfully, the obvious was avoided thanks also to the use of extremely poignant angles, and, of some solid filmmaking's style that ends up making a good use resulting for the most part always highly effective, and never depressing, but, as chilling as it is frantically, increasingly harrowing. The climax was good, and there was even an attempt at some character's development: something you can hardly find in much more over hyped productions made with costs that "Virus X" did not have even in the sum of their catering services. However, it's just a shame Lions Gate hasn't put a tiny bit of effort to market this little cult movie with some respect, in order to keep away trolls with serious personal issues, from being almost the only ones to review and trash cowardly some good, decent work, I was at the very end almost shocked to find so professional, and over all, very entertaining. The cast was a mix of fresh faces, all interesting types, not only watchable, but actually for the most part all believing in what they were saying. Sybil Danning was a hoot as the billionaire villain, still looking great, and changing outstanding prime wardrobe in virtually every sequence she appears. Joe Zaso was believable as a shady professor, and, Domiziano Arcangeli's performance was strong, and unique in its own, despite what some may think of an arbitrary choice of look, and appearance: however, again here we are not meant to take things so seriously since he's just playing a robot becoming progressively envious of human feelings! That per se is one thing that could make many laugh just at the idea, but how do we actually know it could be impossible, since "the creature" is a manipulation of a genre's flawed script? He looks great, and makes the most of it, often stealing the show. Again, I might have given a little less positive review if I had been made believe to be watching a major motion picture, made with million of dollars, or an art house cult. But, we know that Grindstone releases normally what is primarily bad filmmaking, picked and offered often without much of an artistic criteria. Nonetheless, they are still way above some SyFy original presentations, and, not even to be compared to those really dreadful products, made by minor studios like the Asylum. And, "Virus X" against all odds, was a true confirmation of their much better intents. Watch for yourself and you won't be disappointed !

I have to take my hat off to filmmaker Ryan Stevens Harris. With Virus X, he had the makings of your garden variety, piece o' crap, sci-fi schlock fest. This could have been nothing more than the same parade of questionable acting, dubious writing and enervating direction we've all seen so many times before. That obviously wasn't bad enough for Ryan Stevens Harris, hereafter referred to as RSH. He went the extra mile and then some to be sure this movie would leave a lasting impressing on the viewer, like a 9 iron in a baby's skull. RSH wasn't content to let this thing pass blandly before our eyes. He wanted to make us stop and marvel at how wretched it is.Malcolm Burr (Jai Day) is the new doctor hired at a virus research project. He thinks he's helping the world, but the whole thing is really an evil effort to create and release a virus so the project's benefactor, the weirdly old Mrs. Herrington (Sybil Danning) can get even richer selling the antidote. While Burr and his thinly written co-workers are at work in the lab, the project director, Dr. Gravamen (Joe Zaso), is overseeing secret human experiments where people are infected to find the deadliest virus possible. One of those test subjects gets loose, Malcolm and his co-workers get drenched in her infected blood, Dr. Gravamen seals the lab and leaves them inside to die. Can Malcolm and the others save themselves? I didn't care while watching this film and neither will you.Virus X contains no nudity, very little violence and only an ordinary amount of gore. The characters don't even run and do much of anything. They just talk, which makes me suspect that RSH and his co-writer Jeremiah Campbell thought they had the chops to write an honest to goodness drama, something smart and skillful enough to rise above its low budget genre roots. They were mistaken. Let me give you an example of their storytelling "talent".One of the Malcolm's co-workers is revealed to be an informer/spy secretly working for Mrs. Herrington. Now, we never see him do any informing or spying, but that's not the point. It's never explained what he's supposed to be informing on or spying about, but that's not the point. No, the point is that everywhere in the lab in monitored by hidden video cameras, through which Dr. Gravamen can see everything that's going on. If you've got that kind of surveillance of unsuspecting people in a completely enclosed environment, what purpose is an undercover agent supposed to serve? Relaying water cooler gossip or the results of the lab team's fantasy football league? This may not seem like a big deal, but the spy guy has the most personality and the 2nd most back story of any character in the whole production…and it is all totally pointless! Malcolm's other three co-workers have all the inner life of department store mannequins, while this spy guy is given motivation, an agenda and even something close to a character arc. And yet, everything about him is unnecessary and superfluous!That little bit of stupidity, however, is left in the dust by Dr. Gravamen's thug. His name is Jerron and his job is to obtain human test subjects and take care of any problems that arise. Given the setting and substance of Virus X, what do you think Jerron would look like? A corporate killer in a finely tailored suit? Perhaps a paramilitary operative in fatigues and combat boots? Maybe just a looming figure in a hazmat suit and breathing mask? Well, what Jerron actually looks like is an aging "club kid" with a platinum blonde wig, black leather pants, a big ass black leather belt, a long sleeved black shirt and straps up and down his arms. Why does he look like that? Because Jerron is apparently a replicant who somehow escaped from Ridley Scott's Blade Runner and wound up in this dung heap of cinema. No, I'm not kidding you. Jerron is an artificial life form that looks like the middle aged spawn of Pris and Roy Batty. His existence doesn't fit with anything else in the film, but that itself pales when compared to Jerron inexplicably blowing his brains out after getting stabbed in the face with a syringe.I wanted to go into the ridiculous male model haircut on Jai Day, RSH's repeated use of establishing shots long after he's established all that needs to be established and his use of the mega-tired technique of ADHD constant camera movement, but after telling you about spy guy, Jerron and that Virus X had no nudity, very little violence and only an ordinary amount of gore…why bother? Watch this at your own risk.

From the movie cover for "Virus X", I had expected something else entirely than what it turned out to be. The cover looked fairly interesting, but the movie turned out to be far from it.The story in "Virus X" is somewhat captivating in some aspects, but the overall picture is a tarnished and dull result. It was like the air went out of the balloon way before the movie had reached the mid-point of the length. However, the approach to the H1N1 virus strain was perhaps the best take in the movie.As for the cast in this movie, well I can't say that I am familiar with any of them, nor do I even recall having seen any of their faces anywhere. And that is a good thing, because you don't need to be a big, famous Hollywood star to be a good actor. There were some fairly good performances in the movie, but there were also some mediocre ones. And I would say the overall acting scale was just above mediocre, so don't get your hopes up for this one.I had expected more suspense and thrills, perhaps even the occasional scare, but there was no such things. There were some build-ups for some, but they turned out in an anti-climatic way unfortunately."Virus X" comes out on the other side of the tunnel with a flat tire, so to speak. It was, to me, a disappointing movie, and I will not be making a second return to give it another chance. For movies of this caliber, there are others available that have better story lines, plots, and that are more interesting. Sadly, "Virus X" failed to deliver.I found a cure to "Virus X" and that was the 'Stop' and 'Eject' buttons.

It's hard to describe this without feeling like I'm providing a spoiler in some way.Yes, it's a low budget film and most of its weaknesses are connected to the lack of realism that a bigger budget would have brought. At the same time, the director disguises most of those problems and they don't distract from the story.If you've ever seen the TV series Testees, this is something like that turned into a horror film. There's sort of a zombie tease going on with it too. Killing Room also comes to mind.In short, doctors, labs, experiments, test subjects, secrets, blood, biting, infection, chemical weapons, funding from the rich and psychotic.