(REVISED)
There’s almost 30 years spanning the two home video releases of the movie you see above. THREE DECADES!
Just as we’re facing the death of DVD and brick-and-mortar video retail in general, we finally have Enter the Ninja commercially available. I have to think there’s been some sort of rights issue with this movie since the late 80s. It never made the leap from big-box rental VHS to ‘priced-to-sell’ VHS, then never made the leap to DVD in the 90s. It didn’t make the leap from big-box rental VHS to ‘priced-to-sell’ VHS until 1991, and never made the leap to DVD during that format’s boom. A wide-screen print started airing sparsely on cable a few years back, and now that print is available streaming, and for us non-hard drive or cloud-trusting luddites, MGM’s DVD-On-Demand.
DVD-On-Demand??? The ghetto where cult flicks with tiny niche audiences and moldy-oldy genres no one cares about go to languish like retired golden age celebrities in nursing homes? Really?
ETN never had a digital remastering. Never had a deluxe DVD with making-of extras and behind-the-scenes galleries, no commentary by stars and industry experts. No re-issue on Blu-Ray looking even better than it had previously.
Someone explain to me why! And while you’re at it, why did Revenge of the Ninja only get a shitty full-frame disc and why is Ninja III: The Domination still completely out of print? Why wasn’t there a shuriken-shaped box set of this highly marketable trilogy back when DVD collectibles were smoking hot?
But… trying to stay positive, and in the spirit of BETTER-F’N-LATE-THAN-F’N-NEVER, here’s a look at what you can finally buy on one-off DVD from MGM (and for those of you who actually know what century it is, watch instantly on Amazon or Netflix):
As pioneering as ETN was to the Western ninja genre, as a movie in a wider sense it rests on a whole lot of rusty old cliches; the white guy becomes the best at some exotic Asian fighting art, he walks the world alone using his ancient skills to battle modern crime, evil industrialists put damsels in distress, hook-handed hunchbacked henchmen get dispatched with quippy one-liners, etc. and so forth. But ETN did all those things with generously added NINJA VIOLENCE, so we didn’t care!
The current MGM release is a straight transfer of a rather clean and crisp print. They didn’t go in and remaster it frame-by-frame or anything, but it generally looks fine, and I for one dig film grain and pock-marks once in a while to remind me of how much of an old fart I am.
Proper aspect ratio is a bit of a mystery here. The physical disc claims 16×9 1.85LBX, and it looks like a proper widescreen print. However, the more full-frame streaming version on Netflix (via the Starz cable network) definitely has more picture on top and bottom despite the sides being lopped off. One, or both, are cropping here, but both are vast improvements over the pan-and-scan VHS era.
Proper aspect ratio was a bit of a mystery here, but thanks to some astute VN readers and a projectionist buddy, I’m a bit clearer on it. ETN was shot “open matte,” which in a reverse of the usual widescreen-vs-TV print comparison, actually yields more picture the squarer it is shown. Theatrical prints actually sliced the top and bottom of the frame, which was restored for TV prints. This isn’t exactly the preferred technique of the David Leans and Sergio Leones of the film auteur realm, but for exploitation movies intended to have serious legs on home video formats it lent all sorts of presentation flexibility.
I’ve watched the film in both aspects, but I’ll proceed reviewing the physical ‘widescreen’ disc, as I prefer it’s clarity and stability over the varying qualities of streaming. The manufactured-to-order DVD includes the original trailer as a sole extra. It performed fine for me in computer, DVD and Blu-ray decks. It looks great up-sampled in a Blu-ray player on a 1080p flatscreen, with great improvement in color (reds in particular).
Another big improvement is the brightness of formerly dark and inky scenes, where you lost all details. Hasegawa’s raid on the ranch compound now reads a lot cleaner and clearer. And although some colors are actually nicer on the Netflix print, streaming pictures don’t maintain quite the same subtlety of blacks.
I watch this new print with nostalgia, sure, but more with historical perspective, which is greatly enhanced by the new clarity. For instance, it’s easier than ever to see how much Franco Nero looks like a douche in a white ninja suit. Ironically mustached hipsters must love this flick…
I was kinda bummed out to realize the hoods were just cheap spandex. I always thought Kosugi’s in particular was made of sturdier stuff.
Seeing the film bigger, brighter and sharper than ever before also makes it easy to spot when Mike Stone and Sho Kosugi are doubling. A distraction for first-timers just trying to enjoy the flick, but for those of us who’ve seen ETN a few dozen times, it’s a nifty new aspect, and would make one hell of a drinking game.
I’m obsessed with props, and one of the things I love about ETN is it doesn’t feature the same old off-the-rack weaponry seen in most subsequent American ninja flicks. All of this stuff is unique, no Asian World of Martial Arts canned goods here.
However, every time the new print shows off a nicely made custom prop (like this rather rugged looking shuko, which in latter movies would be a mail order nylon version)…
…it soon exposes another that was hastily made and never intended to be scrutinized so.
But then all that goes away when you experience the glory… and I do mean GLORY… of Christopher George‘s magnificent death scene.
So in general, if you are a lifelong fan of the 80s Cannon fare, you’ll love this new edition of Enter the Ninja. It’s just as awesome, and cheesy, and cringe-worthy, and then awesome again, as you remember – but now brighter and clearer than ever.
If you’re not of the right age, however, there’s nothing in this or any other version of ETN that’s going to convert you. You didn’t have our childhood, or our grindhouse or drive-in experiences, or our repeated trips to the video store and contented VHS viewings, never knowing how much better 60s Japanese stuff was… because we didn’t have it.
I for one am grateful to have perspective enough to love both, and I’m delighted to finally own a good copy of this long-neglected genre jumpstarter.
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Many thanks to KC and the other you-know-who-you-are shadow dwellers for the new insights.
