Smartorhypo Highly Overrated But Still Good

Platicsco Good story, Not enough for a whole film

JinRoz For all the hype it got I was expecting a lot more!

Chirphymium It's entirely possible that sending the audience out feeling lousy was intentional

Brian T. Whitlock (GOWBTW) Whrn one must preserve honor, knowing your past is better than living in it. For Cho (Sho Kosugi) , he is a ninja. Back in Japan, he and his friend Braden(Arthur Roberts) encounter massacre of Cho's family by ninjas. Cho and Braden take out the ninjas, then Cho and his surviving family head out the USA for a new life. In California, Cho opens up a doll shop with Braden. Little does Cho knows that the doll shop is actually a front for smuggling heroin for a Mafia boss (Mario Gallo). Little what Braden knows, that the boss want to change the deals. So in payback, he attacks and kills his informers and family members. For Braden, he too is a ninja. For Cho, he swore off being a ninja when he moved to California. He later breaks the oath when his son went missing, and his mother killed by Braden. He had some assistance from Dave Hatcher (Keith Vitali), who was later mortally wounded by Braden. Cho was on a vengeance streak like never seen. Seeing Hatcher as a true friend, he was avenged well. The fight choreographs are amazing, Sho Kosugi really put it very well. You also got to know who are your real friends from the fake one. This movie is fine, s must see gem. 3 out of 5 stars.

BrickNash This was the first Kosugi film I saw of his series and I have to say it spoiled me rotten.I wasn't too Impressed with the other films that he starred in, although I fully recognise his place in bringing about the ninja film boom in the 80's but most of his films seemed to be low budget nonsense with not much 'ninja' involved.None of this applies in this film. Cannon obviously gave the film enough money to look (for the time) reasonably glossy and director Sam Firstenberg, while no James Cameron, does a great job with the so-so but not entirely awful story.The movie has fleshed out fight scenes that occur pretty regularly within the film, keeping the obligatory acting parts to just enough and no more. The fights are respectably choreographed by Kosugi himeslf and while they don't have the speed and flair of Hong Kong action films they stand up as strong, well thought out pieces of work that are enjoyable to watch.The film greatly benefits from a really great bad guy. Arthur Roberts is good as the snake like psudo friend Braden but is even better as the evil, and quite scary Braden-Ninja who disposes of his enemies in a number of imaginative, gruesome and highly enjoyable ways.There are inclusions of some traditional ninja weapons and tools in the film which is nice to see, although while a flame thrower is hardly traditional I'm sure if ancient ninja were alive today they would make use of modern technology to get the job done.Probably the most striking aspect of the film is that, for a movie made in 1983, it is particularly gory and violent for that time with full views of shurikens embedded in heads and eyes and arms being sliced off. It might not seem so harsh these days what with Stallone doing a great job of updating the 80's action hero with Rambo and The Expendables, but at that time it seems a lot of work went into the film and the effort seems to have paid off so well done.A great film for ninja fans, or even just something to watch with a few mates for the grisly deaths.Definitely stands head and shoulders above the rest of the 80's ninja sludge.

bob the moo When his family is butchered in Japan by ninjas, Cho moves to America with his young son and mother to escape the conflict and start anew. He opens a Japanese doll shop and continues his training without ever having the need to use it. Unbeknownst to him though, his imported dolls are being used as a cover for heroin smuggling by his "friend" and business partner Braden – who is also secretly a deadly and powerful ninja. With Braden knocking off his mobster partners, the police turn to Cho to help them identify the martial arts secrets being used, drawing Cho back into a deadly battle he had sought to escape.Someone pointed me to this film as "a great ninja movie" and, despite that, I approached it with a certain amount of caution mainly because I think few things highly praised live up to the hype. So it was with Revenge of the Ninja but not to the point that it wasn't actually a pretty enjoyable film for what it was. The first thing to point out is the very thing you will not need pointed out – it is dated. Really dated. If you were a film designer looking to set a film in a cheesy version of the early 80's then you would do well to watch this film and take notes because it really is of its time. This is not its fault of course, it is only down to its age but it is unavoidably a problem with watching this film today. It is not just visually that the film is cheesy though, because the film is dated beyond just costume and style. The plot is a simple affair but I was pleasantly surprised by the action sequences they produced. Yes they are delivered to terrible TVM musical accompaniment but they are done reasonably well with quite a violent edge to them that belies the 80's presentation. They are not helped at all by director Firstenberg's TV direction but they are still quite enjoyable in a cheesy way.The cast match the cheese with their performances. Shô Kosugi has got moves but he is straight from the "intense stare" school of martial arts acting. Roberts helps make him look good with a performance that highlights when his stand-in was used. Behind the mask in the action scenes "he" is impressively fluid and natural, take those away and he is a big bit of beef and as wooden as you like. The rest of the cast follow this lead, all being pretty poor at acting and generally there because they (a) are Oriental, (b) are muscular goons or (c) are blonde, have 80's underwear and are willing to show their t*ts to camera.Revenge of the Ninja is terribly dated and cheesy but it is hard to deny that it does deliver some solid ninja action. More of a guilty pleasure than a pleasure mind you but genre fans who know what they are in for should find it worth seeing.

Frank Markland Sho Kosugi stars as a ninja who had his whole family wiped out by a rival clan (We even witness his son take an arrow to the back) and when his entire family is killed, except for his mother and youngest son he decides to hang his jammies up and live out his life as a businessman however when his partner runs drugs and Kosugi's son witnesses it, Kosugi must protect his son and take on his equally proficient pal in the art of ninjitsu. Revenge Of The Ninja is quite possibly the best ninja movie ever made. (Ironically the best and worst ninja movies have Sho Kosugi. Worst one being 9 Deaths of The Ninja) In it we witness everything that makes a ninja movie so appealing, lots of cheesy zen philosophy, tons of fight sequences, lots of carnage and just tons of cheese in general. Revenge Of The Ninja also remains probably the best movie to date from Sho Kosugi and indeed it is just unfortunate he had his son also partake in what could have been even better without the kid. Still Revenge Of The Ninja is a very enjoyable movie and that is not even including the granny ninja.* * * out of 4-(Good)