The Ninja Whisperer

Blood sweat and severed limbs aplenty in Ninja Assassin.
By Morgan P Salvo
2 stars


According to a notorious ninja website, “Ninjas are awesome; they cut off heads ~ they flip out and kill”. In the case of Ninja Assassin, they also sever main arteries, hack off limbs and entire mid sections causing torsos to spurt massive amounts of blood. There is literally enough blood pumping out of veins in this movie to fill an aquarium tank at SeaWorld.
Brought to you by the same team as V for Vendetta (the Wachowski bros/director James McTiegue), the plot is simple and the opening delivers the best scene. Yakuza gang delinquents die at the hands of an invisible knife wielding foe involving some major blood spewing, decapitation and gory devastation. Later an Interpol agency in Berlin learns that demon ninjas are to blame, and the biggest, baddest-ass of them all is Raizo (Korean pop star, Rain).
There is a lot of origin story told via flashbacks about a ninja boot camp—think TV’s Kung Fu grasshopper lessons, Lady Snowblood (the movie that influenced Tarantino’s Kill Bill) and Rikki Oh, with Deerhunter’s Vietnamese camp sensibility. Add a dash of blossoming ninja boy/girl love and the recipe is complete. The ninja’s training camp is run by the strict and very evil gruff-voiced super master Ozuno (Shô Kosugi). Due to the vile and intolerable conditions (like torture and murder), Raizo deserts the camp, causing the other ninjas to pursue him as he in turn pursues them. Yes, this another moralistic revenge flick based upon good trumping evil. Raizo left the camp to be good… well not ‘good’ so much as ‘a step above evil’, begging the question, ninja good or ninja bad?
For all of Raizo’s sad back story excuse, he must be the biggest baddest ninja ever or else he’s up against a huge array of weenie-arm ninjas because he dispatches hoards of combatants in every fight scene. There’s massive blood letting, steel tipped bear claw, punishing, swordplay, jabbed ribs, dismembering, fountains-o’-blood, sword-plunging, magical wound healing, flying and whispering ninjas, and a debilitating gut punch. Overtly obvious CGI, the blood spewing becomes hilarious. Sadly most of the fight scenes take place in pitch black leaving only dark blue-hued shadowy figures to pulsate as deep red sprays across the screen. One cool effect is the hallucinatory trail left by the chain knife gizmo hurling through the air.
The music does its darndest to entice, with rap, heavy metal, Sergio Leone spaghetti western themes, and even the Human League--- yes that Human League.
The acting is as cardboard and generic as it gets. Mika (Naomie Harris) is an Interpol agent who holds the key to unlock the details surrounding the secretive assassin clan. Her supervisor Maslow (Ben Miles) is a two face twit, and then there’s Rain, his sinewy body twists through the air as he gets cut, stabbed, whipped, cattle prodded, chained like King Kong but still finds time forgo his ninja cloak to go mostly shirtless… a possible audition piece for the next Twilight flick. Rain’s command of the English language is relegated to saying “let’s go” no less than four times in separate scenes.
My favorite part was when, infiltrated in the dark by evil ninjas, the creepy yet funny whispers would come from everywhere in theatre surround sound hissing: “traitor” “behead him” “shhh” “kill kill kill” etc. It would make a great alarm system for your house.
A combination of Matrix, Crouching Tiger, Iron Monkey wire work, Jet Li’s contemporary martial arts, early 70’s samurai movies, Enter the Dragon and horrible 80’s overseas action flicks, Ninja Assassin falls short only when you think about implausible every freaking scene is.
With over the top high tech visuals, wild gymnastics and gore aplenty, NA still misses the mark more times than its five pointed stars tear flesh
According to my sources, when ninjas aren’t cutting off heads and flipping out they spend their time flying and sometimes they stab. Surrounded by calm, the ninja only whispers and disappears. Be careful of what you say for Ninja Assassin is listening…and preparing its sequel.

Ninja Assassin
Starring Rain, Naomie Harris, Rick Yune, Ben Miles, Shô Kosugi
Directed by James McTiegue