paul_m_haakonsen

Now, when I sat down here in 2025 to watch the 1993 movie "Ninja Vengeance" for the first time ever, I have to admit that I harbored little expectations. Why? Well, the majority of the ninja movies that I remembered fondly from my childhood in the early 1980s weren't really as good as I remembered them to be, as I have revisited them over the years.

"Ninja Vengeance" was a ninja movie without any actual ninjas in it. That was a massive mistake from writers Karl Armstrong and Carrie Armstrong to do.

The storyline in the movie was pretty straightforward, and it was every bit as campy as you would expect a ninja movie to be, so that at least counted for something.

The dialogue in the movie was pretty wooden and terrible. And the acting performances weren't exactly stellar.

I was not familiar with a single actor or actress on the cast list, but that was hardly a surprise.

There was surprisingly little fighting and martial arts in the movie. And I have to say that I didn't for moment believe that leading actor Craig Boyett was trained in the arts of Ninjitsu.

If you enjoy ninja movies, then "Ninja Vengeance" is not really worth spending 87 minutes on watching.

My rating of director Karl Armstrong's 1993 movie "Ninja Vengeance" lands on a generous three out of ten stars.

Of course I had not heard about this 2023 movie titled "Blood, Sweat and Cheer" prior to sitting down and watching it here in 2025. But I have to admit that I wasn't exactly harboring the biggest of expectations to the movie. However, I still opted to watch it, as it was a movie that I hadn't already seen.

Writer Barbara Zagrodnik put together a storyline that was a bit far fetched and implausible. But still proved to be a fair enough movie, as it was a tad out there.

I was not familiar with a single actress or actor on the cast list, which was actually something that spoke in favor of the movie, as I enjoy watching new and unfamiliar talents on the screen.

Sort of a silly movie, given the storyline, but actually proved entertaining enough for how far out there it was.

My rating of director Traci Hays's 2023 movie "Blood, Sweat and Cheer" lands on a five out of ten stars.

Truth be told, I have to admit that I figured I would be in for a stinker here, as the movie's cover seemed to be the type of cover that over-sells the movie by a landslide, whilst the actual contents of the movie is a questionable low budget affair. And I guess the glorious 3.8 rating the movie had landed on IMDb, as of the very moment I sat down to watch it here in 2025, was also a testimony to the fact that this was most likely not a stellar movie. But I still opted to watch the movie on account of it being a movie that I had never heard about, and thus also never seen.

And seeing that the movie was directed by Neil Rowe, written by Neil Rowe and also had Neil Rowe on the cast list, well that definitely also raised some alarm bells. Movies with one guy in all those roles tend to be lousy movies. So there was just a lot speaking against "Robot World".

The narrative in the movie was sluggish and generally failed to provide me with much of any entertainment, so it was a struggle to sit through the movie, especially since nothing overly interesting was taking place throughout the course of the movie. And there wasn't really a coherent red thread to lead the audience through the narrative.

Needless to say that I was not familiar with a single actor or actress on the cast list, and that was actually something that spoke in favor of the movie. The acting performances were okay, but nothing mentionable.

The special effects were actually not all that bad. I've seen far worse effects in sci-fi movies even newer than this 2015 movie.

My rating of writer and director Neil Rowe's 2015 movie "Robot World" lands on a generous three out of ten star.