ULTIMATE NINJA Vol. 1

By: Brian Thomas
Review Date: Friday, February 04, 2005

In the mid-1980s, suddenly there were ninjas everywhere. For some reason, these ancient Japanese assassins were popular icons, and many birthday cakes were decorated with little plastic ninja figures. Though based on the historic entities, these were fantasy characters with martial arts-based magical powers, and though many were decked out in practical camouflaging outfits, some wore flamboyant colorful costumes like Vegas showgirls. The Power Rangers were not far behind. At the heart of this craze were dozens perhaps hundreds of awful movies from the US and Asia, some of which were merely retitled kung fu movies that didn't even have any ninjas in them. The most outrageous ninja movie was surely Robert Tai's NINJA: THE FINAL DUEL, which throws more insane crap up on the screen in 89 minutes than you're likely to see in any other movie. Shortly after its rediscovery on home video by Western fans, rumors began to circulate about it. Some said there was a TV series spin-off in Taiwan. Others claimed that FINAL DUEL was an edited version of an 11-hour complete film. Some weight was added to these rumors when connections were noticed with NINJA KIDS (aka NINJA KISS OF DEATH), a 1982 film from once powerful Hong Kong filmmaker Joseph Kuo (18 BRONZEMEN) which appeared to have been edited from some longer source.

In 2003, Crash Cinema delivered a huge chunk of the puzzle by locating the six-part TV serial from which NINJA KIDS was edited and released it on DVD in 3 volumes under the title VENOM OF THE NINJA. Each volume contained two episodes (which range from 36-45 minutes), and all three volumes were available in a set. Now they've reissued the entire saga with the movie they inspired in a box set for one low price, and even include a foam "ninja star" toy in the package.

Episode 1 introduces us to Tiger (Alexander Lou, aka Lo Rei), an apparent orphan who has grown up to be a bouncer in a brothel in Shanghai circa 1933. Tiger's best friend is his uncle and kung fu master Tai, an old beggar. Fujiko (Lu Feng) and Sakura (Alice Tseng?), secret agents of the Yee Ho-Ling ninja clan, open a rival brothel nearby as a cover for their search for the young man who is unknowingly the shogun's nephew, as designated by a plum tattoo. Hearing this, Uncle Tai intensifies Tiger's training in a series of tortures.

In episode 2, Sakura & Fujiko learn that Tiger is the one they seek, but fortunately they're both double agents that serve Tiger's mother Princess Mariko, who has been in hiding for 18 years after the Grand Master tried to wipe out the entire limb of the royal family tree. Tiger's father Wan Chi-yi is also still alive, but leading a beast-like existence. In the hypnotic thrall of the Grand Master, he wears a scary iron devil mask and has unbelievable martial powers.


Half of episode 3 is a recap of past events, with the film showing its budget level by the colored cellophane around the edge of the frame signaling flashbacks. The other half chronicles Tiger's training and budding romance with Sakura through some mighty strange dubbed dialogue.

As Tiger begins training with a blind master (Chiang Sheng) to learn "ninja kung fu" in episode 4, he begs Sakura to let him see his mother. When she agrees, it puts everyone in danger, and Tiger barely escapes from the Grand Master. In a delirium, Tiger accidentally rapes the girl who saved him from the river, then bugs out on a promise to marry her. Some hero! Also, Devil Mask temporarily escapes and goes on a rampage. In episode 5, Tiger finally meets his mom and is given a Shaolin kung fu manual, in the hope that he can combine styles to beat the Grand Master. Episode 6 wraps things up with a daring plan to kill the enemy.

Crash gives us a rough transfer from a tape source that is unfortunately likely to be the only way to see this serial. I addition, it appears they've matted the top and bottom of the frame to make a "letterbox" format, though it doesn't appear to have damaged the compositions much, and may even enhance them on wide monitors. The sound varies throughout, with volume fading at times. But this brings up an interesting question: why was this serial dubbed into English? With full frontal nudity, softcore sex scenes and plenty of gore, it's hard to say whether this ever actually played even on Taiwanese television, let alone in English territories.

It could be that Robert Tai acted as action director on NINJA KIDS, and then took over as director for the feature continuation of the series. It may also be that FINAL DUEL is a condensation of a second serial. Information continues to be hard to come by on these films, and Crash's box copy doesn't help matters any. All we can do is marvel at the extremely zany plot.

After several attempt by ninja clans to expand into China by conquering Shaolin Temple fail, the Japanese emperor honors the Shaolin monks for their martial arts skills in an effort to bring peace. However, this has the opposite effect, angering Shan Ren (Alan Lee Hoi-hing), leader of the Yee Ho ninja, and making him more determined to destroy Shaolin. Fearing this reaction, the abbot closes the temple to the public, hoping they can concentrate more on peaceful spirituality than on fighting.

The ninjas undergo rigorous training representing the "seven elements" (or "elemets", according to the onscreen titles) breaking bricks and ice blocks, splashing around the lake on big floating toy spiders, dressing up like tigers to climb trees, and tunneling underground. Meanwhile, the Japanese Buddhist monks prepare their champion Tiger now known by his real name Wan Chi-chou (Lou) - to challenge Shaolin. But on arriving, Wan and his sidekick Shou-tin (James Lee) find Shaolin closed, with only Californian surf monks Mark and Moore sitting outside. Of course they get in a fight. Their conflict is interrupted by Han-yi (Alice Tseng), who is under attack by bandits. Since they're camped outside, Wan and his friends are the first ones to be attacked by the ninjas - and because they're from Japan, they're the first to be suspected when the ninjas begin making raids on Shaolin. Wan agrees to stay in Shaolin to help defend the temple and clear his name.

This one has all the frantic fighting, poor plotting and dialogue, and high quantity of nonsense one expects. But Robert Tai seems to be in on the joke, and understands that at a certain point adding more insane crap to a movie only makes it better. He feels free to include gory decapitation, a fighting monk from California (Silvio Azzolini), a jive-talking black monk from Harlem (Eugene Trammel, referred to as a "Shaolin ghetto freak"), and Dracula-style hypnotic mind control. He also gives his fight scenes great flow and a bit of visual poetry. And then there's Alice Tseng's totally uninhibited nude fight scene against a gang of ninjas, which manages to be both very sexy and one of the best fights in the picture! This was one of the films redubbed by Rudy Ray Moore and his friends for release as SHAOLIN DOLEMITE from the Xenon Video label, but that hardly seems necessary considering how hilarious the original dubbing job is.

So, any readers in Taiwan care to shed some light on these crazy ninja movies?

Copyright © 2005 Brian Thomas, author of the massive book VideoHound's DRAGON: ASIAN ACTION & CULT FLICKS.
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