I Suggest Another Strategy. Let The Ninja Win.

I used to argue, and still believe, that in addition to L.A's Disneyland and Universal Studios Tour, Warner Brothers should enter the movie theme park business. The title? Joel Silver World. Yep, visitors to the park could run around Die Hard's Nakatomi Towers, ride on the Lethal Weapon roller coaster, take tours around The Matrix's Zion City while Predator, Demolition Man and Action Jackson mascots have their pictures taken with visiting children. Since The Matrix, Silver has veered away from the medium budget action film he used to be master of, choosing instead to concentrate on either intelligent action thrillers (V for Vendetta, The Invasion), crap horror films (House of Wax, Ghost Ship) or riskier, experimental fare (Rocknrolla, Speed Racer, Fred Claus).

With Ninja Assassin, Silver returns to the wisecracking, high-octane, zero narrative action movie of the 80's and 90's. What there is of plot has Ben Harris (that bloke from Coupling) and the cute Naomi Harris (she of Miami Vice and the Pirates sequels) investigating the myth of Ninja clans. Meanwhile, Rain (the Korean pop sensation...apparently) in a pissed off Ninja looking for retribution. While the two Interpol agents do their snooping, we get flashback scenes to establish the root of Rain's grumpiness and to also illustrate what bad asses Ninjas really are. When the principals meet up the bloodletting begins.

And what glorious bloodletting it is, with bucket loads of CGI type O negative washing across the screen in frantic, ninja action. It's good fun in a turn-your-brain-off action kind of way. And, if you've seen other examples of this kind of movie in this blog, you'll know I'm a champion of the bullshit action movie.

So while I enjoyed this film, I also have to acknowledge it could be much much better. That's thanks to a couple of visual choices by director James McTiege (V for Vendetta). First off it's murky as hell. Many contemporary action movies use a film processing technique to make the contrast in the image more extreme, but mcTiege pushes it too far. Then he makes the mistake of many western martial arts directors; he edits the fighting far too fast. The result is some exquisitely choreographed (probably) fisticuffs that you can barely see. Therefore most of the fighting looks repetitive...making the action boring after a while. Also, watching the series Spartacus: Blood and Sand has reduced my sensitivity for the stylised blood gushing in Ninja Assassin, as the gladiator programme is far more graphic than what's on show here. The script, co-written by Babylon 5's J Michael Staczynski, reflects his usual style; the everyday stuff is a little corny while the ninja stuff is mythic and cool.

Still this is a fun movie that needs to be seen if you're into this type of thing. I just wish McTiege had the balls to shine an extra light on the kung-fu while removing the caffeine from the editing suite. Then we might have been presented with a modern bullshit classic.