NINJAS AND DRAGONS
Ninjas and Dragons is a weird little movie. You watch it and wonder if you’ve seen it before, what decade in came out in, how it had slipped through the cracks back in the day. Largely “inspired by” more familiar … Continued
Another look: KAIKETSU KUROZUKIN
The cambara Lone Ranger looks pretty damn cool in B&W, too, like something off a Saturday matinee serial reel. Although the color originals of these images, first seen here in August of 2009, are absolutely stunning. Kurotokagi has a great … Continued
Five Days of FIVE ELEMENT NINJAS: Day 5
So Five Element Ninjas… is this martial arts alchemy experiment the nexus of one craze on the outs and another on the rise, or is it just an embarrassing oddity shunned like a red-headed stepchild by snobs of two different … Continued
Five Days of FIVE ELEMENT NINJAS: Day 4
BACK IN BLACK! Gold, brown, blue, red and beige schemes aside, FEN also has a damn nifty commando raid where a platoon of black-clad ninja adeptly bypass the kung-fu compound’s ample defenses and lay waste to the remaining students. It … Continued
Five Days of FIVE ELEMENT NINJAS: Day 3
By day three, most of you should be rushing out to some store to buy FEN, and won’t be reading this. However, for you stalwarts still clinging to obsolete concepts like credibility and logic in your movies, let me assault … Continued
Five Days of FIVE ELEMENT NINJAS: Day 2
Okay, so our noble defenders of traditional kung-fu (and kung-fu box office) have accepted the challenge of the invading Japanese genre- uh, army, and away we go – down the yellow brick path of vengeance to… THE GOLD NINJA! FEN … Continued
Five Days of FIVE ELEMENT NINJAS: Day 1
1982 – Hey, you… Kung-Fu Genre. Yeah you, the dominant force in martial arts exploitation in the 70’s. Y’know that flesh wound you got last year from that Golan-Globus ninja flick? Yeah, the one next the scar you got in … Continued
Get a degree in ‘Golden Ninja Warrior’
Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING you ever wanted to know about the Godfrey Ho/Jeseph Lai/IFD/Richard Harrison category of ‘cut together’ or ‘mash-up’ ninja films can be found at Jesus Manuel‘s bi-lingual blog The Golden Ninja Warrior Chronicles. Jesus is a … Continued