As with many movie fans who like to dabble in foreign films, I became interested in Hong Kong action movies in the early 90s. These movies were like nothing that I'd seen before, and I love their bravado. Like many of my peers, I was especially enamored with the work of John Woo, but I checked out other directors as well. However, after a while, the movies all began to look the same and the stories showed little variation. Thus, it's been several years since I've checked out any Chinese action movies. Therefore, I don't know if The Viral Factor is an anomaly or if resembles its peers, but I know that it doesn't look like what I'm used to.

The Viral Factor opens in Jordan where a scientist who had created a new strain of smallpox is being taken into custody by a security team lead by Jon (Jay Chou). The convoy is ambushed and the sample is taken. To make matters worse, Jon is shot in the head and bullet become lodged in his brain. Jon is told that within a short time, he will be paralyzed. Struck by this news, Jon's mother (Elaine Jin) confesses that she had another son whom she abandoned. Jon travels to Malaysia to find his brother Yeung (Nicholas Tse) and learns that he is a criminal. Jon is also able to meet his biological father, Tin (Kai Chi Liu). In an odd coincidence, Rachel (Ling Peng), a scientist, has been brought into the country to work on the smallpox issue, and Yeung has been hired to kidnap her. Jon is able to foil the kidnapping, but this sets off an odd chain of events as Jon's instincts are to bring Yeung to justice, but as his health is failing him, he wants to get to know his brother. However, the criminals who want to hold the world hostage with the smallpox have other plans for them.

Watching The Viral Factor immediately brought to light the things which have and have not changed with Hong Kong action movies over the years. First of all, these films are far more emotional and melodramatic than their western counterparts. We get all kinds of surprisingly saccharine plotpoints here including Jon's anxiety over his health, his mother's confession, the reunion with Tin, and Jon meeting his niece for the first time. Of course, much of the emoting is related to Jon and Yeung attempting to make up for lost time. These movies love for men to bond for some reason, and we get plenty of that here. Asian action movies also have a history of presenting us with characters who tread on both sides of the law and we certainly get that in The Viral Factor. The fact that Jon has only a short time to complete his task allows him to be more comfortable with helping his fugitive brother.

The one huge difference which I immediately noticed was the scope of The Viral Factor. The Hong Kong action films I cut my teeth on were often low-budget affairs which looked as if they were shot on a working street without a permit. However, The Viral Factor was shot in Hong Kong, Beijing, Kuala Lumpur, and Jordan. The movie not only features these varied foreign locations, it also makes the most of them to create truly different looks for different parts of the film. This makes the movie feel like a Bond movie or something from the Bourne series.

Yes, The Viral Factor gives us a lot to explore, but in the end, the movie is a mixed bag. The film throws a lot of story at us for what is essentially a simple plot (bad guys have something which the good guys need to retrieve). It does hurt the movie that the movie relies heavily on coincidences, as Jon seems to always be where the action is going down. The movie's 2-hour running time (which is about 30 minutes too long) makes it seem to drag all the more. It's admirable that the movie wants to create a lot of character development, but it feels redundant at times and seems to slow the story's progress. As noted above, the action is good and the big set-pieces in Jordan and Malaysia are impressive, but these scenes feel as if they could have come from any movies. The Viral Factor is certainly a solid piece of work and it's epic scale is impressive, but it needed to find a better balance of story, action, and drama.

The Viral Factor features a helicopter chase which brought back fond memories of Blue Thunder on Blu-ray Disc courtesy of Well Go USA. The film has been letterboxed at 2.35:1 and the Disc contains an AVC 1080p HD transfer which runs at 15 Mbps. The image is sharp and clear, showing no distracting grain and no defects from the source materials. Gone are the days of 3rd-gen dubs of foreign films, as the picture is very crisp here and the colors look good. The image is a bit soft at times, but the depth is notably good. The Disc carries a DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 track which runs at an average of 2.5 Mbps. The track provides clear dialogue and sound effects. The stereo effects are notable, as they alert us to sounds occurring off-screen. The surround sound effects come across quite well during crowd and action scenes. These effects aren't amazingly detailed, but they are effective. Explosions provide some subwoofer effects, but I noted that they weren't particularly strong.

The Viral Factor Blu-ray Disc contains only three extra features. "Making Of" is a 15-minute documentary which follows the cast and crew through the production. We get comments from actors and the filmmakers, as well as an abundance of on-set footage. The piece explores the story and themes of the film and the actors talk about their characters. We also hear a great deal about the location shooting and the speakers are quite frank about their experiences in Jordan. There is also a detailed look at the stunt work. "Cast & Crew Interviews" contains talks with Director Dante Lam (10 minutes), Nicholas Tse (10 minutes), and Jay Chou (15 minutes). The final extra is the TRAILER for the film.