|
Hot Picks
| |
|
American Commando Ninja
Taiwan 1988
produced by
Joseph Lai, Betty Chan for Adda Audio Visual
directed by Lo Gio
starring Man Fei, Patrick L'Argent, Simon Kwan, Daniel Garfield (= Daniel Browne), Howard Wang, Kelvin Wong, Laura Yang, Lo Kei, Yolanda Kuk, Willie Sun, Martin Chan, Wallace Man
story by AAV Creative Unit, story developed by Godfrey Ho, screnplay by Stephen Soul, music produced by George Lin, action sequence designer: John Cheung, stunt coordinator: Martin Chan
review by
Mike Haberfelner
|
|
|
|
During World War II, professor Tanaka has killed various Chinese in
experiments that led to a formula to be used in biological warfare.
Nowadays, the professor resides in Taiwan. Ninja David is sent after the
professor to ... well, I don't know to do what exactly, but it's a peace
mission. He is soon supported by kung fu-savvy cabdriver Larry - and
somehow the two of them get their hands on the formula. There is however
opposition: Russian Martin and his gang get hold of professor Tanaka and
want the formula as well. And then there's uncle Mark, who has persuaded
his two nieces Brenda and Becky that Tanaka has killed their parents in
World War II (even though they are much too young to have been even born back
then, as is eventually pointed out in the film). After much to and
fro, Brenda and Becky join forces with David and Larry, and in a finale on
a playground, uncle Mark and Martin and his Russians all get their just
desserts. Professor Tanaka though is seen as a mere pawn in the game, so
Larry and David let him go, even return his formula to him, but he refuses
to accept it and vows to work for the good of mankind from now on ... Bottom
of the barrel martial arts flick that probably won't hold too much
interest for any serious martial arts or action film fan: The action
scenes are, aside from the occasional acrobatic interlude, mostly very basic (though the finale on the playground shows a
few nice touches at least), the ninja seems to enter and leave the film
rather randomly (though this is not a cut-and-paste-job for a change), and
furthermore the story is almost ridiculously simplistic while trying its
best to be over-convoluted, and suffering from a edit that doesn't always
make sense. Add to this a
complete lack in taste from whoever was responsible for the costumes
(Hawaii-shirts at the least appropriate moments, garishly coloured shorts), and
your typical cheap ninja outfit, and you've got one bad film ... but one
that trashfilm-fans like myself are almost sure to enjoy nevertheless (on a masochistic
level at least).
|
amazon.com
amazon.co.uk
amazon.de
eThaiCD.com
find American Commando Ninja at adultvideouniverse.com
