The greatest movie ever made..!

Sorry, this movie sucks

The film was still a fun one that will make you laugh and have you leaving the theater feeling like you just stole something valuable and got away with it.

what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.

After a fairly disappointing third movie, without Michael Dudikoff, the fourth movie brings together Michael Dudikoff (playing Joe from parts one and two) and Daving Bradley (playing Sean from part three). And you think that would blow the roof off of the series, but it was hardly so.When Sean is sent in to liberate a team of captured Delta Team soldiers and fail, former ranger Joe is sent in to bring everyone home.And that was basically the storyline summarized in a single sentence. It is a no-brainer all the way through, but it is up to par with the previous three movies. I must admit that it is the first time I have seen or heard about an Arab terrorist group keeping ninjas in their ranks, but sure, why not? You would also think by the fourth movie that the villain might have better trained ninja henchmen about, but you are sadly mistaken. They were still equally worthless.Michael Dudikoff doesn't even show up before into the last half of the movie. But still he is the main attraction for this fourth "American Ninja" movie.By this fourth movie it is starting to really show that there is a growing fatigue in the franchise, which started to show already in the third movie. So I am a little bit hesitant about watching part five.All in all, "American Ninja 4: The Annihilation" doesn't really revive the franchise after the disappointing third movie. But if you enjoy the first two movies then you will also find some enjoyment, at least, in part four.

Michael Dudikoff, although not doing much acting, has more on screen presence in this movie. He's clearly evolved over this series as an actor, and has a leading man charisma to him in this movie.Unfortunately the series didn't evolve with him, but devolved.Seen one, seen em all characterizes this fourth installment of the American Ninja series. Producers might lose interest after the first few production, and they're only making it on inertia. Even a big franchise like the JAWS went the same route, so maybe we can't blame the producers too much.The story is choppy, and doesn't flow smoothly. Trying to find a meaning in a movie like this is a futile effort, but I wished they kept producing the movie in a nicer looking locations as they did in part 2 of this series.

After a quite disappointing third sequel, the fourth one did bring back some grace into the franchise (eventhough it didn't work out as I hoped). Steve James resignation for the fourth sequel (and if I'm not mistaken, this film was made before he passed away) in my opinion was due to the fact that the director decided to bring Dudikoff back after a setback in the third installmentFor me, the most interesting but could have used a little bit of polishing up in the film was the plot itself. A group of soldiers gets captured by an Arab and English terrorist building a bomb. The American government then sends Sean Davidson (David Bradley) to try and handle the situation and when he fails as well, they finally the send in the back the original kickass ninja pro Joe Armstrong (Michael Dudikoff) into the action since it was sort of like when everything else fails, Joe Armstrong doesn'tThis was a pretty interesting sequel and probably the 2nd best of the entire series behind Annilation. To get to this film, I have no real idea why Dudikoff agreed to return back to this fourth installment (maybe he did it just for the sake of the fans of the franchise) but thankfully, he really brought the life back into the series (and for fans like myself) even though he didn't seemed like he was in the mood of acting in this sequel. David's character in this sequel in my opinion was far more respectable than in the third one. He might have done a decent if not good job on the 3rd sequel but in my opinion, his performance here as the 2nd leading actor was way better since he really looks more of a ninja expert in this one compared to the third installmentHowever, there were a few minor complaints that I have for the film. First off, I expected Dudikoff and Bradley to team up together and become buddies like almost immediately in the film but sadly this did not happen for until like the final 20 minutes of the film. The final fights from both sides (Dudikoff's and Bradley's) were not really that entertaining either since Bradley only had to fight a chicken whuss and Dudikoff once again made an Arabic ninja (whose even more quite in the film than Michael was throughout the film) look like a kindergarden amateurAnother complaint that I would like to bring up (although minor) is that I think that it felt like pointless having the scene where Joe was making his weapons (the sword and shurikens) and holding up the sword in front of his face like it was the most important possession that he ever had but in the end, he just fought the enemies with his own bare hands and never used them at all throughout the ending of the film. I think that maybe the director had accidentally forgotten about that part which was why we never got to see Dudikoff using his weapons in the end. Another part that I have to complain was that they never really told the story of how Joe (Michael) and Sean (David) became friends in the first place and all in all, I felt like maybe this was more of like shrink and squeeze in as much as possible kind of plot story than the one that they had originally intended to createHowever, these flaws did not ruin the film too much since I felt it really did make up for the rather disappointing third sequel. All in all, I would really recommend this to all American Ninja fans out there and anyone else who just wants to spend three hours of their time watching some mindless but still a rather fun action movie

Michael Dudikoff returns as Joe Armstrong, the original American Ninja (Who doesn't even show up until half way) who is forced into single handedly rescuing a delta force team as well as the other American Ninja(David Bradley) after the ninjas provide too much even for him. American Ninja 4 walks the fine line between guilty pleasure and just plain bad. There are moments of sheer stupidity that you just can't help but love the antics. For example the movie asks us to believe that an Arab terrorist would have ninjas guarding him. Or that a gang of Mad Maxish rebels couldn't overthrow the Arab terrorist and his minions until the American Ninja (The one played by Dudikoff) arrived plus the bad guy's army actually takes the time to try and arrest what looks to be a thousand rebel soldiers armed with machine guns and axes. The most ridiculous moment arises when Dudikoff catches an arrow in his mouth which he then uses to stab a ninja in the neck with. (Take that James Bond!) American Ninja 4 does have slightly more life in it's fight sequences than American Ninja 3 but really American Ninja 4 is a sub-par effort in all respects as the action sequences while competent are filmed with lack of inspiration and imagination. Still the movie has just way too many unintentionally amusing moments which almost (but not quite) save the day. American Ninja 4 also becomes a laugh riot due to some of the dialog handled with astonishing straight faced seriousness. For example the Arab terrorist and his sidekick James Booth are excited about the nuke that fits in a briefcase, to which the Arab actually activates it and lets it tick down to 1 second which then has the biggest howl of the movie. "It fills me with ecstasy to know that I was one minute from meeting Allah!" However he never elaborates if he means the drug or happiness in general. When Dudikoff finally blitzes the Arab's stranglehold, the Arab runs to the helicopter which leads to another howler of dialog. "Where we headed?" "MECCA!" It was classic moments like this made me enjoy the cheese of this bad ninja movie. Also of note is that Dudikoff and Booth (The best thespians in the movie) give performances of such contempt that is also vaguely amusing. The disinterested performances are still better than any other performance in the film. My wife who is a good sport, sat through this with me and said the funniest remark. "How lame of a ninja do you have to be to wear a bright yellow ninja suit." *1/2 out of 4-(Poor)