Ebola Syndrome (1996)

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

I cannot think of one single thing that I would change about this film. The acting is incomparable, the directing deft, and the writing poignantly brilliant.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

Don't buy the hype because it doesn't live up to it! A restaurant employee wanted for murder contracts Ebola by raping a woman in South Africa and starts an outbreak there and in Hong Kong when he returns home. One of the bleakest films I have seen in a long time. All characters are unhappy souls, surviving in a grim world, unable to improve their lot, prone to an almost genetically determined urge to mess things up. Worse, these characters were walking cardboards. From an artistic standpoint, there were some plot elements and character developments I didn't think were totally needed. They do however drive the story, which seemed to be their purpose, so I can accept them at the end of the day!

This Grand Guignol comes from the austere People's Republic of China? Jende ma?I sat through about half of this frenzied mess before tuning out. It isn't that I found it too gross. The living frogs being chopped up weren't so bad. I've dissected frogs in class. The chickens getting their heads wrenched off weren't that offensive because I saw lots of chickens get it when I was a child. I helped castrate pigs in Pago Pago. It's that it was badly made, as if by an amateur on crack.It's loud, fast, full of lurid color, and in the first half hour the director gives us -- let me think -- well, it begins with adultery, goes on to torture and mass murder, spitting a ginder into a pot of tea, doing to a piece of pork what Alexander Portnoy did to a piece of liver in "Portnoy's Complaint," rape, decapitation, ejaculating into a body in its death throes, serving sweet and sour pork to a diner who'd ordered steamed pork, and wearing white after Labor Day.Violence can be done poetically. It has more impact when some care is taken with it. It was shocking when Roman Polanski's midget put a slice through Jack Nicholson's naris in "Chinatown." This violence is boring because the film is nothing but violence. Can anyone sit through a pornographic feature film without being bored? No. No one can. This movie runs into the same problem with satiation. Enough doesn't necessarily mean that the bloodshed and degradation must be forced on you as if you were a Strassbourg goose.Let's face facts. Anyone who finds violence, sex, blood, and screaming insults attractive, has never been married.Well, let me add a plus. Most of the Chinese girls are very attractive, dressed or disheveled. Gong Li should have shown so much flesh.

Was this movie perhaps supposed to be a parody of those silly Italian horror movies from the '70's and mostly '80's? Sure looks like it to me. It has the same sort of style and also silliness over it. Fans of that genre will surely be able to appreciate this movie.This is really one crazy movie that goes over the top with mainly its silliness. Its silliness also ensures that this movie never truly reaches the level of greatness but at the same time it also makes this a very entertaining movie to watch. You can say that the movie its silliness is both reason of its success and of its downfall. Unfortunately the movie also tends to get a bit worse as it progresses. It looses some of its flair after a while, also due to its rather poor and simplistic story that just isn't heading into the best direction at times. The movie at the start showed far more potential. It's not like the movie totally disappointed but at the same time it also could had been a far better one if only the second halve of the movie would had been more like the first one. The second halve is just far less interesting and it doesn't always pick the best character to follow through the story.It's a movie that features some gore as well as nudity (the main character is a serial rapist and killer) but overall it's not all as much as the first halve hour or so of the movie would suggest. It turns into a quite tame movie that perhaps also picks a too 'serious' approach for its movie in the end. Like I said before, it's a bit of a waste.Guess not all people will be able to appreciate this movie and its style but those who are a bit familiar with the similar type of Italian movies from the '70's and especially '80's will surely enjoy watching this movie. They will take this movie simply for what it is; a simple enjoyable guilty pleasure, that is not the best but also certainly not the worst movie to watch out there.7/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

If I was asked to describe Ebola Syndrome in one word, it would have to be; hilarious. "What?" You might be thinking, "How can you describe a movie that features dismemberment, cannibalism, animal mutilation, self-mutilation, rape, gratuitous nudity, racial slurs, autopsy dissections, and an infamous masturbation scene with pork meat, as hilarious? How? Because in spite of all the nastiness featured in Ebola Syndrome, it actually resembles a gross-out comedy, than a horror film. That's not to say the the film doesn't have it's share of edgy, disturbing violence... it's just done very comically. And better yet, it works damn well.Anthony Wong reprises his psycho/rapist/killer role again for another outing with director Herman Yau. Along with Danny Lee, these two were behind the much more serious and darker "Untold Story." Drawing comparisons between the two films seems inevitable because they are very similar in plot and both feature Anthony Wong doing what he does best... acting like a raving maniac. But while Untold Story is a dark and mean monster of a film, Ebola Syndrome is it's more light-hearted cousin. Kai(Anthony Wong)is a psycho, who flees Hong Kong after brutally murdering the family of his employer (all of which happens before the opening credits) to take a job in South Africa working as a chef in Chinatown. Ten years pass, and Kai finds himself stuck in a dead end job with no way out. After visiting a local Zulu tribe to purchase pigs, Kai gets infected with the lethal Ebola Virus. But Kai is "one in ten million" and instead of dying he becomes a carrier for the disease. Shortly after an argument ensues at his work, Kai ends up murdering his employer and his wife, chopping up their bodies, and feeding their Ebola infected bodies to customers as "African Pork Buns (Notice any similarities)." After finding his employer's cash stash, Kai decides to return to Hong Kong; but not without a trail of bodies along the way.The secret of Ebola Syndrome's success is that it's not afraid to go completely over the top. Combined with genuinely funny humor, the film manages to be one fun ride. Anthony Wong gets to deliver a multitude of great lines with dead-pan nonchalance while he's ruthlessly dismembering or raping one of his many victims. I guess you have to have a dark sense of humor to get this film, and it's not for the squeamish- the autopsy scene is truly disgusting- but if ultra-violence is your thing, Ebola Syndrome delivers a wildly entertaining and sadistic ride.Bottom Line-If you like extreme cinema seek this out. A blissfully disturbing fun time.