Shaolin contre ninja

Shaolin vs Ninja is a nonstop mind blowing fight fest, the best and most coherent outing from Robert Tai, the Taiwanese madcap maverick (see also 'Ninja final' duel & 'Shaolin Dolemite') In this 'Chinese vs Japanese' sub-genre we see the typical portrayal of the Japanese as evil bloodthirsty thugs, and the Chinese fighting coming out tops over the inferior Japanese style. The martial arts scenes (which is most of the movie) are second to none, the choreography and ability of the performers are mind blowing (all pro martial artists here). One of my favorite scenes is the tournament in the court yard, where the Chinese are pitched against the Japs(funnily enough) in a series of bouts which are breathtaking in their execution. There's a cameo from director Robert Tai here also.

People complaining about the plot (or lack of), the character development and silly dubbing are missing the point, this is a madcap fight fest, which also has some well impressive super sized Buddha statues. "Amor Tofo"

The movie itself is not very good. The problem with this movie is that we don't have a main character to follow. There's too much look alike monks and it's kind of hard to know who is who. The ninjas are a little bit boring in this film , but watch out for the shaolin monks...they rule. I watched it in french and the "Praise be to buddha" thing was incomprehensible. Maybe this expression has not been translate in french...You may give this movie a 4(out of 10), like me, if you watch it for the fights.

Alexander Lo outdoes his earlier movie "Mafia vs Ninja" in this one.

"Praise be to Buddha."

I watched an English language version, which had some of the worst dubbing I've seen--there are many lines where the characters continue to speak for two seconds after the voice is finished.

"Praise be to Buddha."

The choreography you have to see for yourself (but then again, there's not much reason to watch these dumb kung fu flicks except for some good laughs).

"Praise be to Buddha."

One of the biggest weaknesses of "Shaolin vs Ninja" is that there is not really one main character to follow (theoretically Alexander Lo, but he is absent for a lot of the movie).

"Praise be to Buddha."

Oh, yeah, and how could I forget? If you like drinking games, why don't you try having a beer everytime the senior monk says, "Praise be to Buddha."? If your brain hasn't atrophied by the end of the movie, you will surely have died of alcohol poisoning.

"Praise be to Buddha."

Rating: 2/10, but only because there's actually worse

"Praise be to Buddha."

this is for the action.not acting.i know people make fun of the "praise be to buddah" thing but seriously though.the fighting techniques are to be appreciated and maybe even studied if your into martial arts.these monks devote their entire lives to this supreme regimen and style that they incorporate.the weapons fighting is classical ancient style.just like in the ancient battles of the far east. i was mesmerized and i admit to having a few laughs but it was'nt in laughing at the movie.it was rather the type that i do at seeing something so awesome it astounds me to the point of laughing. it was extremely serious.not an upbeat type of flick that you'd expect in the karate kid tradition.no charasmatic characters either. the acting of course is going to seem subpar to many but this is what it's really about when it comes to hard core martial artistry.it's not about having all this plot and drama.i know this explanation is cliche but this is the shaw brothers/wu tang series.it's about all out no nonsense and no show off cry babies.these intricit techniques are to be appreciated and learned from.this is'nt about learning to be an actor.it's more about learning to be a real warrior. rating. 8/10.

Great fights throughout, any viewer looking for excellent choreography, this is a must see.