If you’ve had the pleasure of seeing recent documentary Electric Boogaloo: the Wild, Untold Story of Cannon Films, it’s feasible that, like myself, you may well have found yourself anxious to see these three movies. In many respects, this trilogy might well be the perfect embodiment of the Cannon Films ethos. The output of producers Menahem Golan and Yoram Globus is renowned for having ambition that far outstrips budget, and for putting entertainment value first, with questions of quality control very, very low on the agenda. And yet, whilst their emphasis on pushing product and garnering mass appeal often meant they were shamelessly derivative, in their own curious way Cannon could be relatively innovative at times – and this, it seems, may have been the case when they made Enter the Ninja in 1981. This film, CJ Lines argues in this box set’s accompanying pamphlet, was the real starting point for the ninja movie boom of the 1980s. Whilst the script reportedly borrows heavily from Eric Van Lustbader’s novel The Ninja (a best seller that same year), Cannon were the first to put ninjas front and centre on the big screen – and while ninja movies and martial arts movies in general were nothing new, not too many had been produced in the US before.
Of course, watching Enter the Ninja now, it’s very, very hard indeed to consider it in any way innovative. It’s ultimately a very standard ninja movie set-up played out with the utmost simplicity, the only real surprise being that it’s a US production; we might easily mistake it for Italian, given it’s shot in the Philippines, stars Franco Nero and Christopher George and has all the dialogue looped in afterwards. I guess this ultimately is the heart of Cannon’s legend; that they built their brand on this kind of standard exploitation, yet managed to break through into the mainstream.
Nero takes the lead as Cole, a Vietnam veteran who we meet as he completes his training at an elite ninja academy. The spaghetti western icon was cast at the eleventh hour, and it’s clear from one bare-chested training scene in which he brandishes nunchucks that he didn’t know the first thing about ninjitsu, but one of the obvious advantages of those ninja suits is they make it very easy to hide the stand-in. In any case he looks considerably less embarrassed than Susan George, who co-stars as the wife of Cole’s old army buddy Frank (Alex Courtney), who has built a business in the Philippines and developed a heavy drinking habit since the war. However, as is pretty much obligatory in any kind of martial arts movie, the business is under threat from shady tycoon Venarius (Christopher George), who wants Frank’s land for his own nefarious purposes. As such, he naturally sends his goons around to beat the shit out of Frank’s employees. However, once Cole is on the scene with his badass ninja skills, it’s payback time. But as only a ninja can kill another ninja, Venarius must get one of his own – in the form of Cole’s disgruntled former ninjitsu student Hasegawa, played by Shô Kosugi. Enter the Ninja was Kosugi’s first screen credit, and the stuntman-turned-actor wound up the one common element of all three of Cannon’s ninja movies.
1983’s Revenge of the Ninja is essentially a name-only sequel, and sees Kosugi graduate from villain to hero as Cho, another ninja master whose world is turned upside down when – in quite an eye-opener of a prologue sequence – almost his entire family is slaughtered by a rival clan. Arrows in the missus, shuriken in junior’s head, the works. Our ninja hero and his American buddy Braden (Arthur Roberts)* waste no time in getting bloody retribution, and ultimately only Cho’s baby boy and mother escape with their lives – and, taking Braden’s advice, Cho agrees to emigrate to the US with them in order to escape the threat of the ninja. However, fast forward to a decade later, Cho’s son Kane (Kosugi’s real-life son Kane Kosugi) inadvertently discovers that his father’s art dealership is being used by Braden as a front for heroin smuggling. Not only that, but Braden himself is also a ninja, and has been donning his suit and a nifty silver mask to take out the local mafia who have been standing in the way. Would you believe, another conflict between ninjas is in the offing – as, in case you’ve forgotten, only a ninja can kill a ninja. Did we mention that?
(*Note: the previous paragraph has been edited, as it incorrectly read that the main villain was Keith Vitali as Dave Hatcher. We can only assume we were confounded by a ninja mind control trick.)
Enter the Ninja may have set the scene for the ninja movies of the 1980s, but it was Revenge of the Ninja that really got the mix just right. Thanks at least in part to the Salt Lake City setting (apparently it worked out way cheaper for Cannon to shoot it there than in Los Angeles), this movie has a more authentically American feel, and – as may be apparent from the earlier description of the film’s opening scene – we have a considerably higher gore quota this time around. Revenge also ups the sex appeal, with the addition of Ashley Ferrare’s Cathy (one of only three screen credits for the model-turned-actress), an all-American blonde bombshell who trains in ninjitsu with Cho whilst not wearing a great deal, gets manhandled by Prof. Toru Tanaka, and is creatively tortured in a hot tub clad in a thin white vest – none of which advances the plot any, if that was ever a question. It all adds up to a near-perfect bottom shelf video shop action movie experience, gloriously implausible and illogical and all the more enjoyable for it.
However, that’s nothing compared to how mind-blowingly implausible and illogical things get in Ninja III: The Domination. As I mentioned in my Electric Boogaloo review, if there was one movie that documentary left me anxious to see, it was this one; how could I not feel that way about a film summed up as a ninja movie mixed with The Exorcist and Flashdance? Hitting upon the idea of a female ninja (bonus feminist points!) but feeling the audience would not accept that a woman could have that level of skill and strength (minus feminist points!), the team hit upon the idea of an American girl being possessed by the vengeful spirit of an evil ninja assassin. In so doing, they also added a hint of slasher movie to the mix, as Christie (Lucinda Dickey), a phone line engineer/aerobics instructor – I can but assume this was a commonplace job combination for young women in 1984 – is unwittingly turned into an instrument of evil, taking bloody retribution against each of the cops that shot the Black Ninja to death – one of whom is Christie’s new boyfriend.
Really, with such an out-there premise, how could Ninja III not be a complete blast? Lovers of 80s camp will be like pigs in shit with this film, as it’s packed with pink neon lighting, spandex, big hair, gratuitous workout sequences and synth rock, along with plenty of kick-ass action; cars and helicopters have a bigger role to play this time around, and the supernatural element ups the absurdity quota that bit further. In a curious way, it actually seems to run out of steam a little as it reverts to more stereotypical ninja territory in the finale, which sees Sho Kosugi come back to the forefront in what’s ultimately just an extended cameo this time around. Still, you could scarcely ask for anything better for a bit of out-there midnight movie fun.
While all three movies all work perfectly as stand alone efforts, it’s entirely appropriate for them to be united in this way, so this box set from Eureka is more than welcome. It may be a disappointment to some that it’s pretty low on extras – we have a couple of not particularly compelling commentary tracks and trailers – but the aforementioned accompanying booklet is entertaining and informative, and most importantly the films themselves look and sound great. If only it came complete with a six pack and an Indian takeaway, this box-set would be all you’d need for an exemplary Friday night in.
The Ninja Trilogy is available in a dual format DVD and Blu-ray boxset on 18th January 2016, from Eureka.