Shadow Fury

I bought this film for the sole fact that Bas and Funaki from Pancrase were in it. I had no idea what its story was like except that it involved ninjas and Bas was the bad guy. I thought it was an OK film but it could have been better. The fight scenes with Funaki were pretty cool and the final fight between him and Bas was really cool, but the story, acting, and characters were kind of mixed up. Pat Morita should have been in it longer too. The actors looked like they were really trying to act good but ended up less than stellar. The hired killer, Madson, was actually funnier in serious spots than his comedy lines. Anyway it was an OK film because Bas and Funaki were in it, but if they weren't I probably would not have even looked at it.

In the near future, a vengeful scientist, Dr. Oh (Noriyuki "Pat" Morita) sics a ninja clone (Masakatsu Funaki) on his former associates. Panicking, they obtain the services of a sullen killer for hire (Sam Bottoms) to go after the ninja. But our supposed antagonist is actually struggling against the compulsion to kill since it is something he's been conditioned to do, and not something he truly wants to do. The ninja falls in love with a sweet-natured hooker (C.G. Walker), ultimately teaming up with the hitman to exact some old-fashioned justice.

For a routine B movie with a rather familiar storyline, "Shadow Fury" entertains adequately. Certainly, if you're a fan of mixed martial artist Funaki, you may be amused; his performance is stiff, but it does seem to suit the role. He gets the most to do with his character, which adds some weight since he is living that old science-fiction trope of an automaton discovering or strengthening their humanity. For MMA fans, it will be nice to see Funaki square off against his peer Bas Rutten, although the latter only comes in near the end. Morita, a.k.a. "Mr. Miyagi", does look like he's having some fun playing a cliched role, even sporting cliched mad-scientist hair.

A lot of the writing and acting is pretty cheesy. Still, it's fun to watch Allan Kolman do his thing as the villainous Dr. Hillier. You may recognize him from another creepy role as a parasite victim in David Cronenberg's "Shivers". Fans of Taylor Lautner (from the "Twilight" series) will note that the actor (nine years old at the time) plays the youngest incarnation of the Rutten character, who matures at a very rapid pace. Fred "The Hammer" Williamson is kind of wasted as a bar owner who doubles as a weapons dealer.

The action scenes are decent enough. "Shadow Fury" won't knock anybody's socks off, but it holds the attention. There's also a fair amount of gore, a bunch of explosions, the sexily dressed Walker, and a reasonable amount of poignancy to make this an okay viewing.

Six out of 10.

In the beginning of the story, it reminds me about the movie Karate Kid, because of Pat Morita. He died so soon in the movie. There are lots of scene that are not so convincing. In times that Madsen, the bounty hunter, was already down and helpless, Takero, who has the opportunity to kill the man who killed his creator, just walked away. Anyway, Takero's reluctant to kill Madsen is one of the factor that lead them to battle Kismet. 7/10

It is based in the future where genetic cloning of enhanced human killing machines is possible. However to prevent this from happening the world health organisation makes this cloning illegal. A group of scientists at the Nova Corporation, a leader in cloning research, have made miraculous advances in the replication of human beings. When one of their colleagues, a mad scientist by the name of Dr. Oh( Pat Morita ), creates an "Obedience Strain" that will allow him mind control over the clones, Nova Corp casts him out and revokes his license. Dr. Oh vows revenge on his three partners, Drs. Markov, Forster and Hillier, and creates a clone that is the perfect killing machine, Takeru, a killer ninja clone. Meanwhile, Nova Corp learns of Dr. Oh's plan and dispatches a bounty hunter, Madsen, to destroy Dr. Oh, Dr. Oh's laboratory and any clones he may have developed. Madsen has his work cut out for him because with Takeru on the loose, it's only a matter of time before the clone finds them all! Madsen kills Dr. oh but suffers severe injury at the hands of takeru. With Takeru on the loose hunting down those who killed his maker Madsen is hunting Takeru with the plan of killing him and using his liver to replace his own as he will die without a liver transplant due to his excessive drinking. Dr.Markov is then eliminated by Takeru and Madsen teams up with Dr.Forster( Alexandra Kamp-Groeneveld) to take down Takeru. Meanwhile Dr.Hiller has created clones of his own to take out Takeru. Takeru then meets up with a lonely prostitute who teaches him to be human. In a confrontation with Madsen Takeru has a change of heart and decides to let Madsen live rather than kill anymore innocents. Takeru falls in love with the prostitute. In an accident Takeru kills the prostitute as she attempts to stop him killing again. Takeru is grief and guilt stricken and teams up with Madsen and they go up against Dr.Hillier's evil clones for the big finale where Takeru takes on Kismet. Even though some of the acting isn't up to much the fight scenes are first class as the 2 fighters( Bas Rutten & Matsakatsu Funaki ) are from the UFC and have fought each other for real in the octagon!

Why did I rent this, you ask? I was hoping for a new martial arts hero. Boy, was I wrong! There are not enough words in the great American thesaurus for me to describe how dreadful this was. Acting was worse than a pornographic film and the action was lame. I suffered through the 90 minute, straight-to-video release and almost threw the disc out my window! Guess I'll be sticking to Chan & Li for the time being.