Gui mian ren zhe (1982) User Reviews

Ninja fun abridged from a trilogy

[HaemovoreRex · 5/10 · 16 May 2006]

Lo Yiu aka the Super Ninja himself Alexander Lou stars in this entertaining ninja fest as a bouncer for a local brothel who is blissfully ignorant of his true identity as the rightful master of a ninja clan.

Yes it's clichéd, yes our hero overacts pretty horribly, yes the dubbing, script and voice-over work are all about as (endearingly) bad as you might well imagine and yes the fight scenes are as you would expect from Alexander Lou, excellent (if unfortunately sped up in many scenes) However, the whole film feels disjointed and badly structured with a great many references (from the protagonists) throughout of important occurrences that are not even shown on screen.

There is a good reason for this however.....this movie has actually been condensed i.e edited down from a three part series known here in the UK as Ninja Tiger and Ninja Death in the US. No wonder then that much of the overall coherence has been inevitably compromised.

In light of this, whilst the film reviewed here is certainly an enjoyable enough watch in its own right I recommend that viewers seriously interested skip it and watch the whole unabridged trilogy instead which showcases a cohesive story with loads more fights and intrigue.

"so bad it's good"

[bobdabaron · 5/10 · 20 March 2022]

One of that genre. To be enjoyed ironically with friends, it's the fun kind of terrible. Mostly adding a review to report the number of times he says "TEACHER!" so nobody else has to go through the effort of counting. 52 from the main character, five from other characters. Don't make a drinking game out of that word, you will lose.

Stock Standard

[evolute · 5/10 · 15 July 2009]

Every night our local community television broadcaster Triangle, attempts to show another one of the countless straight to video, copyright lapsed, or otherwise cheap-as title from the last century.

Everything schlocky, camp, comedy, drive-in, westerns, martial arts, war related etc.

Sometimes there are some gems, but more often than not it's passable stuff.

I thought this one might be just over the line of worthiness.

Yes it's somewhat fun with titties and such, however you'll have to ask yourself how many times you can handle the same 5 sound effects in fights throughout the movie!

Truth be told I fell asleep.

Loads of ninjas, not for kids.

[gemproductions · 11 July 2000]

This is a low budget Hong Kong ninja movie, but entertaining and fast moving? You bet!

Of course it´s the old tale of revenge, but who cares about plot when you get non-stop fighting and a bit of nudity put in for good measures. Most of the fight sequences are quite good, but I was wondering a bit why the characters were spitting out gallons of water when they got kicked. (And this ninja movie actually has loads of ninjas, black ninjas, blue ninjas, demon ninja...)

See it if you can find it, not the worst of it´s kind.

Ninja, Sex, and Death

[ebiros2 · 7/10 · 22 June 2009]

This is a total spoof of all the Ninja TVs from Japan by Hong Kong movie studio. It has more ninjas than any ninja movie or TV made in Japan, and fight scenes are more kung-fu than sword fighting, but it's entertaining. If you figure in a brothel into the above picture, you get a pretty good idea what this movie is all about.

I think what they left out of the title is Sex. Because there're lots of Ninjas, killing, and ...fair amount of sex in this movie, all done in good humor .... "try a Japanese style .... ?".

First of a trilogy, this movie is one (actually three) of a kind Hong Kong movie that's pretty well made and entertaining to watch. It's surprising that this movie series isn't better known in this country (maybe not enough airtime on TV due to its graphical contents ?). Little too much sex to be a cult classic, but it deserves a place in HK cinema history.

Recommended if you can find a copy.

A guilty pleasure / treasure for fans of cheap, Hong Kong Ninja flicks

[t_atzmueller · 7/10 · 20 February 2013]

You're either a fan of 1980's ninja and martial arts film or you are not. If you belong to the second category, you don't need to read on (and probably came across this page by accident anyway). However, if you are a fan, you probably grew up with the cut-and-paste Ninja flicks produced by Godfrey Ho and the likes, and likely counted the colors of ninja costumes, am I right? Black ninjas, red ninjas, blue ninjas … Brace yourself! "Ninja Kids" not only has all the colors mentioned above but also a golden Ninja (presumably perfect for robbing treasure chambers) and a demon ninja, wearing a devil's mask under his cowl, who goes berserk at the sound of a flute! And there is more: a band of crippled kung fu masters (blind, hunchbacked and lame), a brothel full of nude women (some are ninjas, some are not), samurais, geisha's (also nude) and violence! Plenty of gratuitous, blood-spitting violence! Or perhaps you fancy some Chinese slapstick – you know, lots of finger wiggling, eye popping and drunks talking through mouthfuls of wine? "Ninja Kids", a gift that keeps on giving.

(Ninja-fan)-heart, what more could you ask for in life? Since this is a Taiwanese film, don't expect, apart from the costumes and cowls, nothing "authentic ninja" in this film; the actors playing the Japanese samurai and ninja are clearly Chinese, but most Western eyes would notice the difference, just as Chinese could tell Irishmen from Italians apart – probably not at all. Instead you'll see plenty of faces that may be familiar from many-a Golden Harvest / Shaw Brothers production, among the more prominent Alexander Lou, Sheng Chiang and Feng Lu.

The movie is actually a compilation from a trilogy of films, namely "Ninja Death" part one to three, which, if physically possible, are even more difficult to find, but if "Ninja Kids" caught your fancy, you can't go wrong with triple the time.

7/10 (measured by Ninja-flicks-standards, of course) – makes the ninja-film-fan wonder, why anybody would bother to produce films that DON'T feature ninjas in colourful costumes.