Let's be realistic.

hyped garbage

One of the best movies of the year! Incredible from the beginning to the end.

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

Better than the original one, Enter The Ninja. It's the same story and was also made by the Cannon group but this was campy. If you just thought it couldn't get any worser well, here you have it. Ever seen a granny ninja? Or gratuitous violence toward a ninja kid? The use of cheap effects are in full glory to watch, throwing stars flying into faces, nails in heads, nudity for no reason at all, but we liked it! Or have a look when a girl appears in a red robe forgotten to put a trouser on, but she's fighting nevertheless. It's so typical eighties, look at the clothes, look at village people at a playground...It's more bloodier than Enter The Ninja but it is really campy at sometimes. Only for the freaks of eighties smut.

This was the first Kosugi film I saw of his series and I have to say it spoiled me rotten.I wasn't too Impressed with the other films that he starred in, although I fully recognise his place in bringing about the ninja film boom in the 80's but most of his films seemed to be low budget nonsense with not much 'ninja' involved.None of this applies in this film. Cannon obviously gave the film enough money to look (for the time) reasonably glossy and director Sam Firstenberg, while no James Cameron, does a great job with the so-so but not entirely awful story.The movie has fleshed out fight scenes that occur pretty regularly within the film, keeping the obligatory acting parts to just enough and no more. The fights are respectably choreographed by Kosugi himeslf and while they don't have the speed and flair of Hong Kong action films they stand up as strong, well thought out pieces of work that are enjoyable to watch.The film greatly benefits from a really great bad guy. Arthur Roberts is good as the snake like psudo friend Braden but is even better as the evil, and quite scary Braden-Ninja who disposes of his enemies in a number of imaginative, gruesome and highly enjoyable ways.There are inclusions of some traditional ninja weapons and tools in the film which is nice to see, although while a flame thrower is hardly traditional I'm sure if ancient ninja were alive today they would make use of modern technology to get the job done.Probably the most striking aspect of the film is that, for a movie made in 1983, it is particularly gory and violent for that time with full views of shurikens embedded in heads and eyes and arms being sliced off. It might not seem so harsh these days what with Stallone doing a great job of updating the 80's action hero with Rambo and The Expendables, but at that time it seems a lot of work went into the film and the effort seems to have paid off so well done.A great film for ninja fans, or even just something to watch with a few mates for the grisly deaths.Definitely stands head and shoulders above the rest of the 80's ninja sludge.

Incredible! Just incredible! Funny how just about every movie you loved as a child seems so stupid once you're an adult. But this film seems BETTER somehow! Most likely this is due to the fact that I took it seriously as a boy. Now, in addition to the incredible martial arts and stunt work, I can also appreciate the so-bad-they're-hilarious moments. I tell you I didn't want this movie to end. I was either gasping at the stunts or violence, or howling with laughter at some of the ridiculous characters and dialog. Let's put it this way: the past 90 minutes are some of the most entertaining of my recent life.The film deals with a ninja warrior played by veteran martial arts star Sho Kosugi who travels to America with his mother and son after the rest of his family are massacred by an army of ninjas in the opening scene. He intends to go into business with an American partner selling Japanese dolls in an art gallery. But this business partner named Braden is up to no good. He has the dolls stuffed with heroin and plans to use the gallery as a front and sell off the opiate to the mafia. When the mafia tries to double cross Braden, we find that there is much more to him than meets the eye. He is also a ninja! A bad-assed ninja, at that! He begins to carve up some of the mafia guys, and then eventually turns on Kosugi and his family. This sets up a spectacular duel between the two ninjas in the film's final ten minutes.But getting there is also very fun. There are absolutely no dead spots in the film. There is action in virtually every moment. The body count has to be close to or exceeding 100. In addition to ninjas and the mafia, our hero must also deal with some street thugs that look like rejects from the village people! In one scene, a guy dressed like an Indian (moccasins and all) breaks into the studio with some buddies and tries to steal the dolls for the mafia. Kosugi, while kicking these guys' butts, makes Jackie Chan look like a wussy. Jumping over cars, dodging bullets, you name it. In a later scene, Kosugi and a police buddy roust a group of additional village people types in a park as onlookers watch with amazement! The moves, the weaponry, the situations.... I just cannot describe how entertaining this movie is! Though it takes place mostly in Los Angeles, it was filmed in Salt Lake City. That looks like a beautiful place to live. In many of the scenes you can see the Wausach Mountains in the background. The acting is pretty bad, but it only helps to add the one's enjoyment of the film. And the guy who plays Braden looks kind of like Will Ferell in the scenes when he's unmasked! And when he's dressed as a ninja, he wears this evil-looking silver mask. Really adds to the character. Not much more I can add. If you're into martial arts flicks you simply must see this. It hasn't been on TV for years. 10 of 10 stars.The Hound.

The only thing worse than acting was, the fightscenes. And of course the plot was a laughing matter. Poor choreography, poor dialogue, poor acting, a 6 year old that defeats adults with his martial arts skills and in general so many laughable clichés (the mafia guy has an Indian chief (who's the most non-native-American looking guy in the world) and so many poorly executed scenes make this movie a complete farce... 1½ hours of time wasted and a good evening ended because the poor quality of this movie hypnotised everyone to sleep.The only redeeming quality I can think of was the healthy amounts of blood when the evildoer is finally brought down by our courageous hero. Of course not until after the evil boss guy has defeated him time and time again almost casually. Several times fooling him with the help of mechanical dolls of himself that somehow materialise out of thin air when needed the most.I've watched I don't know how many kung-fu, samurai and ninja movies and I can honestly say that none of them has been as poor as this one.