Chinese New Year is upon us once again and for this edition of the Fridae Movie Club newsletter, we vow not to recommend films that were made for the Chinese New Year since you'd end up watching them anyway not matter how terrible we and you think they are.

Instead, our pick of the week is The Viral Factor, a globetrotting adventure by Dante Lam about a a potential viral outbreak. Think of it as Steven Soderbergh's Contagion but with international terrorists, a largely Malaysian locale, and Taiwanese superstar Jay Chou as an international law enforcement agent assigned to stop the disaster from happening.

Another action film is Haywire. Featuring MMA champion Gina Carano beating the living daylights out of her male co-stars in single unarmed combat, the film is Soderbergh's love letter to 1960s French New Wave thrillers, 1970s American action films, 1980s Hong Kong action films, and Quentin Tarrantino's homages to these genres.

If you have to escape from CNY festivities, why not take your favourite pre-teen nieces and nephews along to watch Journey 2: The Mysterious Island? The action-adventure visits more of the Jules Verne canon and features several set pieces that are entertaining, visually and technically impressive, though short on real world logic.

Jack and Jill is strangely appropriate for a Chinese New Year film. Adam Sandler plays a pair of twins — the passive-aggressive Jack and his sister Jill, the annoying man-child with boobs. Yes, it's Sandler in drag. Al Pacino plays Al Pacino, who falls in love with Jill. Who as I've mentioned, is Sandler in drag. Much hilarity ensues in this romantic comedy with a twisted family bonding theme.

Till next week,

Vernon Chan