American Ninja

As one who pretends to have benefitted from a post-graduate education, I am almost ashamed of my love for this, the best/worst of the Ninja flicks. And while Ninja films are no longer in vogue among the "militia in training " college drinking crowd, this one is worth a look by anyone who loves MST3K or bad movies in general. The stupidity of this film is so self-contained that it needs no clever running commentary, but feel free to drink a few beers and add you own MST3K witticisms anyway.

Check out this plot: a band of terrorists hijacks a busload of tourists and makes several unclear demands. The terrorists are led by Alby the Cruel (Blackie Dammett, father of Red Hot Chili Pepper Anthony Kiedis), who sits in a wheelchair wearing elegant lady's gloves, accompanied by his pet monkey. Alby speaks in a poor German accent, with such great lines as "Az you gan zee, the hoztagez are un-har-med!" Alby's crew includes sexy Col. Honey Hump (a militant lesbian), Dr. Wolf (a sexual deviant) and Rahji the Butcher (Alby's gay lover). Of this bunch, Rahji is the most hilarious, wandering around with this forced malevolent chuckle all the time.

The good guys that come to save the day include Sho Kosugi, whose normal gravelly, yogurt-filled voice is cleverly dubbed by someone who sounds like a pop radio deejay, and Bent Huff, who spends most of his time grinning Puckishly whenever Sho Kosugi gets into a fight (trust me, I'm not making this up). Emilia Lesniak rounds out the trio, a sexy blonde of such immeasurable talent that she never worked in cinema again. Their commander , Vijay Rankin, is played by Vijay Amritraj, that dorky Indian tennis pro who starred in the lame James Bond flick "Octopussy" opposite Roger Moore. Amritraj has many pathetic lines, but the best one comes when he gets a phone call and exclaims, "What? Hijacked?"

Is there a reason to see this film? Well, this one has the potential to be one of the all-time great beer-drinking movies, even though it has nothing to do with fraternities, sex or keggers that last until the wee hours of dawn. I quit drinking when I graduated from college, but I still pop "Nine Deaths" in the VCR now and then because in brings back the giddy sensation of intoxication without the hangover. This one is as bad as it gets, and yet, like a car crash or an episode of "Saved By the Bell," you watch it in spite of yourself.

If ever a bad film deserved a cult following, however, this one is it.

Come on, it is B classid movie, yeah the movie is very bad, but this is history and funny just watch it and remeber the 80's

For starters, the title is misleading. Nine Deaths of a Ninja? Fat chance. I hope the ninja would have used up his nine lives early on and get this movie done with. Nine deaths? Pfffft.

Okay, the plot, if there is one. A German (of course a German, and a Nazi, swastika flag and all) terrorist and his amazing bunch of henchmen and -women kidnap a bus load of tourists. They take them to a remote place in jungle and demand the release of Rahji Mohammed, some kind of fellow terrorist. The best special team, consisting of Shô Kosugi, Brent Huff who looks like he's escaped from a toothpaste ad and a gorgeous but oh-so-clever blonde Emilia Crow, is sent to take care of the problem.

The actor who plays Rahji Mohammed, Sonny Erang, sure has a challenging role to play. No one, not even the severely retarded mental patients I have seen in hospitals, laugh menacingly all the time. Rahji had two or three lines in the whole movie, the rest of the time he just laughs. Oh and he must be a really nasty guy: he takes some balloons away from children and squeezes the balloons until they pop. Terrifying. The rest of the terrorists show their bad to the core nature by stealing medication from a girl with severe heart condition.

The rest of the actors are just as wooden as Sonny Erang. Brent Huff is expressive as a brick (and I always thought Ben Affleck is wooden!) and Shô Kosugi is downright awful. The same you can say about every single soul in this pathetic excuse of a martial arts movie. Oh wait! There is someone who was relaxed and expressive: the little monkey. He was well cast.

The fight scenes are so stupid they are laughable. The bad guys stand in line and neatly wait their turn as they are being slaughtered. I wonder why this movie has been cut and given high PG, there is nothing to see here, not so gory violence and no sex, excluding a pair of titties in one scene.

Saving the hostages is forgotten for a long time while the brave men of the rescue team visit a floating whorehouse (Madame Whoopee's Floating House of Fun or something like that) where the assassin-trained whores try to kill our hero's, but one of the assassins loses her bikini top and they have to abort the mission...

The "hejsan så ska vi dansa" amazon women, lead by the queen bitch Honey Hump (!!) are maybe the most laughable element of this movie. And the Rahji's explosives in the mouth scene... how the hell can it leave the head untouched but come out of his butt???! Beats the hell out of me. But what can you expect of a movie where the best actor is a monkey in diapers.

9 Deaths of the Ninja (1985)is one of those guilty pleasure films. It's so bad that it's enjoyable. A fourth entry into the Ninja series (following Enter the Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja and Ninja III: The Domination). 9DOAN stars Sho Kosugi as a government agent who travels to the Philippines in order to stop a gang of terrorists.

Sho Kosugi's acting is about as good as his English and the rest of the cast makes him look like Sir Lawrence Olivier. This movie is so bad, bad in the tradition of the cheese classic Final Mission. But I enjoyed very, very much. If you like Sho Kosugi or those wacky Cannon films, then this one's for you!

Highly recommended (for all the wrong reasons).

My review was written in April 1985 after a screening at UA Twin cinema in Manhattan.

"9 Deaths of the Ninja", originally titled "Deadly Warriors", is a relentlessly silly martial arts picture that lampoons the genre rather than providing straight ahead action. Most customers will not be amused.

Villains Alby the Cruel (Blackie Dammett) and Honey Hump (Regina Richardson) kidnap a busload of tourists in Manila, demanding the release of a terrorist from the Middle East named Rahi (Sonny Erang). At the U. S. embassy there, Rankin (Vijay Amritraj) calls for U. S. aid, with a three-person rescue squad sent in, made up of Japanese specialist Spike Shinobi (Sho Kosugi), macho Steve Gordon (Brent Huff) and a lovely blonde (Emilia Lesniak).

Martial arts activity and frequent shootouts are tediously interrupted by failed comedy as villains Dammett and Richardson camp it up outrageously, styled respectively as a Dr. Strangelove-type German megalomaniac and a lesbian sadist. Among the good guys, Kosugi, who previously starred in "Revenge of the Ninja" and on tv's short-lived "The Master" series, tries lamely for laughs, sucking on a lollipop between fights. Brent Huff is once again (as in the French-made "The Perils of Gwendoline") a handsome but bland sidekick, while Emilia Lesniak never deigns to mess up her hair or makeup in a supposedly action role. Kosugi's two kids Kane and Shane are also featured, with Kane strutting his chopsocky skills well.

Writer-director Emmett Alston who previously served as second unit director on earlier Kosugi pics, wastes good production values with his meandering script. Tennis star Vijay Amritraj, who served as exec producer, pop up occasionally to make in-jokes, such as using a telephone shaped like tennis balls.