First an observation and that is evidently Chinese women in the 1980's didn't shave their pits or at least that's what I saw in Ninja Terminator, twice.
Now that I got that off my mind what about the movie, well it's simple with "Ninja Terminator" you can expect an action-film that bares all the hallmarks of director Godfrey Ho - it is completely typical of his work and a fine representation of his ninja-movie-mastery of the 80's. This flick is really busy with the kick, punch and yell formula, as there must be at least a dozen fight scenes (often crudely edited, bringing extra laughs) crammed into 88 minutes worth of movie and unlike "The Ultimate Ninja" (a totally incoherent cut n' paste job) this movie is more coherent, having some semblance of logical thought behind it and like in most movies, it has only one plot to follow, which is contrary to what's seen in The Ultimate Ninja. Do to incompetence and a total lack of taste (i.e., insipid dialog, garish synthesizer scores, the ripping-off of popular movie titles: Ninja TERMINATOR) Ho's films are always a hootin' good time at the movies and a true treasure trove of trash-cinema.
With Ninja Terminator top-billing deceptively goes to Richard Harrison, but in reality it's much more of a Jack Lam (as "Jaguar Wong") movie, owning to the fact that he has three times more screen time. Jack Lam (of Japanese descent if I'm not mistaken) is a kickin' machine and first-rate martial artist, who seems to be a natural in front of the camera, as he unfailing exudes confidence (to the point of arrogance) whenever and wherever he finds himself and in scene after scene he easily defeats his opponents with his superior mastery of the martial arts; often seen casually chewing gum, while flashing a series cocky smirks/smiles as he's kicking the crap out of his opponents and afterwards he'll typically cap the moment with a sarcastic quip. I for one just hope that Jack has his feet insured, because he's Busy with em'. The fight choreography this time around is top-notch, if not a bit repetitive, which is all but unavoidable with more then a dozen fights breaking out.
The plot once again revolves around this small golden statuette known as the "golden ninja warrior" (that breaks down into three separate pieces) which as before, has been stolen and whoever possesses the whole statue will be the mightiest ninja in the land - or in other words will have supremacy among ninjas. Like all of Godfrey Ho's ninja-flicks the cheese-factor is simply off-the-charts, some scenes more so then some others, for example the scenes that laughably involve 8-inch tall battery-powered toys (i.e. Transformer knock-offs for the oriental market) with flashing lights, delivering "or else" messages and later on the very same toys are seen delivering VHS tapes... this is how Mr. Ho chose to advance the movies plot... only in the 80's. Besides how could you not take seriously an off-brand Transformer figurine whose message is: "Traitor, listen. - You have just three days - to return - the golden ninja warrior - to our master. - Hear & obey."
As with his films of that era all the actors voices are dubbed-over, but the words for once actually come close to matching their lip-movements, but I'm not sure I like that, I prefer the dialog to be as out-of-synch as possible - just for humors sake. As with these terrible films of Ho, the sound is always extremely shrill and is loaded with either terrible sounding synthesizer music or music taken from other movies (such as John Barry's music from "The Deep") and of course it wouldn't be right without over-doing it with the sound-effects, because after all when someone kicks or punches air it makes a loud swooshing noise, right? The movie ends with a trio of ninjas duking it out over ownership of the "golden ninja warrior" on some sea cliffs over-looking a harbor. In this final fight an orgy of ninja gimmickry unfolds, a whirlwind of action where the ninja elite pull-out every trick in their bag. This scene ends in a flurry of spectacular nin-jastic high jinks and then all of the sudden "BOOM"!
The End.
These truly are great terrible movies. For the uninitiated if it's second-rate ninja flicks you seek, go with the obvious choice, Mr. Ho's 80's out-put is the true cream of the crop of the genre. Start the drum roll "Godfrey Ho's Ninja-Schlock-Theater" presents (add ANY title of the DOZENS he cranked out in the 80's AND 90's - "Ninja Knight Thunder Fox" being the tackiest of them all).
Keep your ears open, in the middle of the movie you'll hear the word "ninja" pronounced "ningur" on at least three occasions. Also take note of the goofy Garfield phone - one could not and should not ever take these movies seriously - but they are fun. It's my wish that there was a huge Godfrey Ho ninja-flick box-set (of 25 discs or more) out on the market. Make it happen Ho-Man.
Now that I got that off my mind what about the movie, well it's simple with "Ninja Terminator" you can expect an action-film that bares all the hallmarks of director Godfrey Ho - it is completely typical of his work and a fine representation of his ninja-movie-mastery of the 80's. This flick is really busy with the kick, punch and yell formula, as there must be at least a dozen fight scenes (often crudely edited, bringing extra laughs) crammed into 88 minutes worth of movie and unlike "The Ultimate Ninja" (a totally incoherent cut n' paste job) this movie is more coherent, having some semblance of logical thought behind it and like in most movies, it has only one plot to follow, which is contrary to what's seen in The Ultimate Ninja. Do to incompetence and a total lack of taste (i.e., insipid dialog, garish synthesizer scores, the ripping-off of popular movie titles: Ninja TERMINATOR) Ho's films are always a hootin' good time at the movies and a true treasure trove of trash-cinema.
With Ninja Terminator top-billing deceptively goes to Richard Harrison, but in reality it's much more of a Jack Lam (as "Jaguar Wong") movie, owning to the fact that he has three times more screen time. Jack Lam (of Japanese descent if I'm not mistaken) is a kickin' machine and first-rate martial artist, who seems to be a natural in front of the camera, as he unfailing exudes confidence (to the point of arrogance) whenever and wherever he finds himself and in scene after scene he easily defeats his opponents with his superior mastery of the martial arts; often seen casually chewing gum, while flashing a series cocky smirks/smiles as he's kicking the crap out of his opponents and afterwards he'll typically cap the moment with a sarcastic quip. I for one just hope that Jack has his feet insured, because he's Busy with em'. The fight choreography this time around is top-notch, if not a bit repetitive, which is all but unavoidable with more then a dozen fights breaking out.
The plot once again revolves around this small golden statuette known as the "golden ninja warrior" (that breaks down into three separate pieces) which as before, has been stolen and whoever possesses the whole statue will be the mightiest ninja in the land - or in other words will have supremacy among ninjas. Like all of Godfrey Ho's ninja-flicks the cheese-factor is simply off-the-charts, some scenes more so then some others, for example the scenes that laughably involve 8-inch tall battery-powered toys (i.e. Transformer knock-offs for the oriental market) with flashing lights, delivering "or else" messages and later on the very same toys are seen delivering VHS tapes... this is how Mr. Ho chose to advance the movies plot... only in the 80's. Besides how could you not take seriously an off-brand Transformer figurine whose message is: "Traitor, listen. - You have just three days - to return - the golden ninja warrior - to our master. - Hear & obey."
As with his films of that era all the actors voices are dubbed-over, but the words for once actually come close to matching their lip-movements, but I'm not sure I like that, I prefer the dialog to be as out-of-synch as possible - just for humors sake. As with these terrible films of Ho, the sound is always extremely shrill and is loaded with either terrible sounding synthesizer music or music taken from other movies (such as John Barry's music from "The Deep") and of course it wouldn't be right without over-doing it with the sound-effects, because after all when someone kicks or punches air it makes a loud swooshing noise, right? The movie ends with a trio of ninjas duking it out over ownership of the "golden ninja warrior" on some sea cliffs over-looking a harbor. In this final fight an orgy of ninja gimmickry unfolds, a whirlwind of action where the ninja elite pull-out every trick in their bag. This scene ends in a flurry of spectacular nin-jastic high jinks and then all of the sudden "BOOM"!
The End.
These truly are great terrible movies. For the uninitiated if it's second-rate ninja flicks you seek, go with the obvious choice, Mr. Ho's 80's out-put is the true cream of the crop of the genre. Start the drum roll "Godfrey Ho's Ninja-Schlock-Theater" presents (add ANY title of the DOZENS he cranked out in the 80's AND 90's - "Ninja Knight Thunder Fox" being the tackiest of them all).
Keep your ears open, in the middle of the movie you'll hear the word "ninja" pronounced "ningur" on at least three occasions. Also take note of the goofy Garfield phone - one could not and should not ever take these movies seriously - but they are fun. It's my wish that there was a huge Godfrey Ho ninja-flick box-set (of 25 discs or more) out on the market. Make it happen Ho-Man.