NEW YORK NINJA (2021)
It seems every time I turn around these days, someone close to me is telling me about a movie or show that I HAVE to watch. I don’t mind someone trying to turn me on to something new, as I also push the movies and music I love on my friends all the time, but I do get annoyed with the “you must watch this” routine. Even though I’m mainly into movies about superheroes or that have “Death” or “& Furious” in the title, I am open minded to checking something out. But if you are telling me I "must" watch something, I only have one simple question to ask about this film or show:
Are there ninjas in it?
If the answer is no, then do not tell me I “have” to watch it.
NEW YORK NINJA absolutely has a ninja in it.
There’s a fairly interesting story behind the release this banger of a movie:
In 1984, a small film company hired marital artist John Liu to star in and direct a low budget ninja film in NYC. After it was shot, the distributor went out of business, the money dried up, and the project was never finished—with the footage put in storage, likely never to be seen again and the original audio being destroyed over time. ~35 years later, the fine folks at Vinegar Syndrome purchased the rights to a library of older films and came across this title and were blown away by its cheesy awesomeness. They enlisted director Kurtis Spieler and got the help of some heroes of the action genre like Don “the Dragon” Wilson and Cynthia Rothrock for voiceover work and edited the 1984 footage into a complete movie.
NEW YORK NINJA has everything the bloated action films of today lack. It’s got curiously multi-cultural street gangs terrorizing the locals of 1984 NYC (which of course, is so comically overrun with crime that it looks like they're in the dystopian nightmare world of MAD MAX) for what must be minimal financial gains. It’s got an organized crime boss with a poorly explained scheme involving some sort of sex trafficking. There's another villain who is known as the "Plutonium Killer" who's got some sort of superpowers involving radiation that, of course, are never explained either. And, most importantly, it’s got a vengeful ninja looking for justice who’s pretty much a superhero.
At one point in the film, the ninja gets on roller skates! NEW YORK NINJA is essentially DEATH WISH 3 if Bronson had been a ninja on roller skates—and if that doesn’t make you want to watch this film immediately, you and I will never agree about movies. It’s a glorious hodgepodge of what made low budget ‘70s and ‘80s action so much fun.
Not that you should expect it to be, but NEW YORK NINJA is not flawless. The dubbing is a little off in spots, which doesn’t help the comically bad acting, and the plot hits the typical ninja cliches to that it’s essentially filling out a checklist. In real life John Liu (the titular NEW YORK NINJA) was an accomplished martial artist, there's even a few unconfirmed stories out there about how he sparred with Chuck Norris and made easy work of the future Walker, Texas Ranger and meme king.
That said, at least in NEW YORK NINJA, his fighting style seems fairly run-of-the-mill and nothing he does jumps off the screen and wows you in the way that Bruce Lee or Norris did. Given the history of the production, it’s amazing this resurrected projects makes as much sense as it does, but there are a few weird edits and points in the film where you feel that a scene is missing, which it undoubtedly is.
None of that should keep you from tracking down this glorious piece of schlock. I'd argue the flaws add to the fun and cheesiness of it all, and that's a huge part of the charm here. NEW YORK NINJA is the most fun I’ve had watching a movie in years, and I can't imagine anyone not having a great time with it.
Currently it's only available in physical media format from Vinegar Syndrome—and it's totally worth paying for. But I'd bet it'll be streaming somewhere soon.
