Virus (1980 film)
1980 film by Kinji Fukasaku
Virus, known in Japan as Fukkatsu no Hi (Japanese: 復活の日; lit. "Day of Resurrection"), is a 1980 Japanese post-apocalyptic science fiction film directed by Kinji Fukasaku. Based on Sakyo Komatsu's 1964 novel of the same name, the film stars an international ensemble cast featuring Masao Kusakari, Sonny Chiba, George Kennedy, Robert Vaughn, Chuck Connors, Olivia Hussey, Edward James Olmos, Glenn Ford, and Henry Silva.
At the time of its release, the film was the most expensive Japanese film ever made.
Plot
In 1982, a shady transaction is occurring between an East German scientist, Dr. Krause, and a group of Americans involving a substance known as MM88. MM88 is a deadly virus, created accidentally by an American geneticist, that amplifies the potency of any other virus or bacterium it comes into contact with. The Americans recover the virus sample, which was stolen from a lab in the US the year before, but the virus is accidentally released after the plane transporting it crashes, creating a pandemic initially known as the "Italian Flu".
Within seven months, virtually all the world's population has died off. However, the virus is inactive at temperatures below -10 degrees Celsius, and the polar winter has spared the 855 men and eight women stationed in Antarctica.
Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Virus (1980 film)” is 1980 film by Kinji Fukasaku. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Virus, film and Kinji, not as a finished interpretation.
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The phrase “1980 film by Kinji Fukasaku” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.
Object files, edition statements, performance records and contemporary criticism preserve different stages of the work’s history. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 18, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q1459428. 9 of 9 selected statements include explicit references; 9 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1980, 1964 and 1982.
Rights, attribution and provenance may remain disputed even when a general reference summary presents a stable account. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Virus (1980 film)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.