hkr4627@acf4.UUCP (Hedley K. J. Rainnie) (04/13/85)
Warning: The review of 9 Deaths of the Ninja is a SPOILER, and a flamer
which employs more hyperbole than any review ever on net.movies.
This review is done on the fly, so it is hardly poslished. But
after yelling for one and a half hours straight, the idea of
polishing this review seems pointless.
Just came back from the first day of the movie '9 Deaths of the Ninja'
Without question I consider this film to easily be one of THE WORST movie
ever produced. The worst thing about it is that some money obviously went into
the film--all of it badly misspent.
Note that I mean worst in the true sense of BAD, as opposed to offensive
or pretentious. BAD as in bad acting, bad direction, bad script, bad music,
bad stunts, even. Just BAD.
First of all, one of the film's executive producer's was Vijay Amritraj,
the tennis player. The man is one of the world's worst actors. He isn't
even good enough to be a B-movie extra. What's worse is the 'cute'
tennis reminders are scattered about his person: a tennis ball telephone,
and references to his tennis playing. The scene where he receives a tele-
phone call with bad news yields an expression of anguish that can
only be described as the silliest facial contortion ever seen in cinematic
history. Every scene with VJ is a real scream.
Beyond this, the film is incredibly ill-conceived in almost every aspect.
The director was trying to make a James Bond film, a Spielberg film, a
Bruce Lee film all in one. So much for intentions.
We know things are bad from the very beginning. The film starts with action,
which after about a few seconds, we figure out is mock-battle. The
director feels compelled to draw this out for several minutes before
'surprising' us by having a 'dead' guard stand up.
Next we are treated to about the most pitiful ripoff of a Maurice Binder
James Bond title sequence where Kosugi swipes, martial art-style, at a trio
of dancing girls to the tune of truly wretched music.
Basically the whole plot is that a bunch of truly pathetic innocent people
are kidnapped from a tour by a bunch of lunatic terrorists. Our heroes,
a martial arts master, an all American named Macho Man and a blonde
comminications expert must rescue them. Just guess if they succeed.
Freaks as bad guys are cool: just look at Mad Max/Road Warrior or Buckeroo
Banzai. But these freaks in 9 deaths aren't even two dimensional. They're
pathetic cutouts designed by committee. "Gee, Melvin, I think we should
throw in a Nazi." "Great thinking. What about adding a lesbian?"
There's this big Jaws clone who can catch a round from a.45 ACP with his
palm. He gets his GI tract blown out of both ends.
There's a neo-nazi in a wheelchair with a German accent intolerable for a
high-school production. He 'participated in the Munich massacre'. This
Dr. Strangelove ripoff gets crushed by a bunch of polo ponies.
There's a lesbian Sandanista woman and her three female soldiers she offers
as reward to the rest of the freak army for good work.
How about some bad scenes. A fight scene. Bad guy jumps down from the
balcony onto a box, and the next cut, he IS DEAD!!! I guess there was
something sharp inside the box but I didn't see, or he did the old "fall
on his own knife number"
How about this. A bad guy is getting ready to do his dirty numbers on a
tour guide. A kid lights his asshole with lighter fluid. Big yoks there.
The guy tries again later, but gets hauled away in his underpants by the good
guys.
Kosugi gets attacked by a bunch of karate midgets who appear from nowhere
and procede to attack his testicles.
The bad guys decide to do in the hostages. Instead of wasting them with
the arsenal of AK-47's they carry, they decide to use a cartoon-style
time bomb complete with a couple sticks of dynamite and a large ticking
clock. Kosugi and Jaws fight Goldfinger style here, but don't even think
of making any further comparison.
A little oriental kid ripoff of Short-Round beats up on a few full grown
guys and in a touching scene, rescues a little girl's heart medicine
The cowgirl communications expert apprehends a bad-guy by GLUING HIM TO THE
GROUND WITH A GLUE ROCKET LAUNCHER! The boos were so loud during this that
the dialog for the rest of the scene was unintelligible.
Lots of catching spears, arrows, bullets, etc. with bare hands.
Interestingly enough, the violence is pretty tepid. Not a lot of people
die, and director doesn't have the guts to kill many innocents. Even
the evil women escape death unlike their male counterparts.
Strange weapons: Grenade-bolt launching pistol crossbow (looks like a
Barnett Trident), hand held rotary (6 barrel) weapon, lots of nun-chucks
and shurikens. The blood was purple and more thicker than maple syrup.
The team communicates via Dick tracy watches with built in radios. We got
floating whorehouse-boats, on-land whorehouses, lots of helicopters, dumb
logos on jumpsuits (JSOA or something).
Bad lines: "Want clean woman. No clap."
"Our girls are sanitized (something)ized and lobotomized."
In conclusion, every scene, almost without exception, was ineptly done.
Either you knew exactly what was going to happen or you had no idea what
the point of a given scene was.
At the end of the movie, the audience was standing and screaming "REFUND!"
and "we want our money back!!" I am still so sore from yelling that I can
hardly speak.
You want to see a bad movie and come back hoarse? This is the one to see. No
review could possibly do its badness justice.