A small-time thug (Wong) is caught having an affair with his Big Brother and (under threat of castration) decides to slaughter them. He flees to South Africa, where he gets a job in a Chinese restaurant. It seems the gweilos (white guys) aren't too keen on selling the Chinese decent meat, so Wong and his boss head out to the plains to deal with a tribe -- who happen to be infected with the Ebola virus. Being the sleazy, horny guy that he is, Wong rapes a tribeswoman and becomes a carrier for the Ebola virus. It turns out that Wong is one of the "lucky" people who can become infected and not die, but still transmit the virus, which he does by chopping up his boss and wife into "African buns" (hamburgers). After discovering his boss' stash of American dollars, Wong beats a hasty retreat back to Hong Kong -- but not before the daughter of his former Big Brother sees him and alerts the police. Can the HK police stop Wong before he infects all of Asia?

Ebola Syndrome features graphic sex, castration, a man's head getting splattered in a folding table, a woman's tongue getting cut off and attempted murder of a child -- and that's just in the first fifteen minutes! It only gets worse (or better, depending on demented you are). If you think what the kid does with pastry in American Pie is sick, wait until you see what Wong does with a piece of raw meat. If that doesn't get you going, how about a full-on autopsy? Or perhaps you want even more gratuitous sex. Don't worry, all that -- and more -- is here.

Despite the over-the-top nature of the movie, Ebola Syndrome manages to be quiet and reserved in parts, mostly through Anthony Wong's great performance. He has a really dry wit that should please fans of ultra-black comedies such as Man Bites Dog, such as one sequence during the opening slaughter when someone walks in on Wong about to kill a child and screams "What are you doing?" to which Wong calmly replies "What does it look like? I'm killing them." and then walks out the door.

If you're looking for lots of gratuitous sex and violence (and are not easily offended), you can't go wrong with this movie. Even though it treads familiar ground (it's really more of a remake of the Cat III classic The Untold Story with bits of the US movie Outbreak thrown in for good measure), Ebola Syndrome will most likely shock, disgust and/or excite even the most jaded viewer. It's exploitation cinema at its finest. I just wonder what all the right-wingers raising a stink about the relatively tame South Park and American Pie would do if they ever saw this movie...

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