by Anthony O'Connor
Worth: Discs: 1, The Film: 2.5/5, The Extras: 3.5/5, Overall: 6/10
FilmInk rates movies out of $20 — the score indicates the amount we believe a ticket to the movie to be worth
Cast:
Hiroyuki Sanada, Noriko Watanabe, Mikio Narita, Akira Nakao, Jun Miho, Seizo Fukumoto, Sonny Chiba, Strong Kobayashi
Intro:
... will thrill the small group of hardcore fans who already love it and leave everyone else profoundly bewildertained.
The Film:
Umbrella has dusted off and prettied up so many odd and obscure cinematic offerings that sometimes it’s fun to just randomly nab a title with an interesting looking cover and have at it. A blind pick, if you will. Such was the case here, Ninja Wars, a 1982 Japanese martial arts/horror from director Kōsei Saitō that, during the end credits, had your humble scribe channeling their inner Krusty the Clown, asking: “What the hell was that?”
What indeed?
What it isn’t, is a movie that earns the title Ninja Wars, because other than a brief opening sequence and some stuff in the back end, there’s very little that resembles a war. Not all that many ninjas either, frankly. Perhaps Odd Bloody Flick with a Number of Bizarre Skirmishes is a less attention-grabbing title. However, there’s plenty of psychedelic nonsense, needlessly convoluted plotting and goofy touches that will either keep audiences bewildered, entertained or in some middle state between the two. Bewildertained?
Set during the Sengoku period of 16th-century Japan, the plot (and we use the term veeeery loosely) of Ninja Wars revolves around a prophecy delivered by dodgy wizard wanker Kashin Koji (Mikio Narita). Basically, it says that whoever wins the heart of the beautiful noblewoman Lady Ukyo (Noriko Watanabe) will rule the world. Naturally, this catches the attention of evil feudal warlord Danjo Matsunaga (Akira Nakao), who decides he wants in. Rather than just wear a nice pair of trousers and speak in complete sentences to woo the maiden fair, Danjo employs Kashin and his five gronky evil magic monks who enact a perilously convoluted scheme involving Ukyo’s long-lost twin sister (and secret ninja!) Kagaribi (also played by Watanabe). The evildoers intend to harvest virgin’s tears from Kagaribi for a love potion, but she tops herself instead, which only temporarily halts Kashin’s plans because they decapitate Kagaribi’s corpse (what?), pop her head on another woman’s body (why?) and thus create a third identical looking character, Lady Hellfire (ALSO played by Noriko Watanabe. We hope she got time and a half for this nonsense). This leads to Kagaribi’s lover Fuefuki Jotaro (Hiroyuki Sanada) to vow revenge and begin to hunt down all who did his misso wrong. There’s a bunch of other stuff going on, including a criminally underused Sonny Chiba, but that’s the basic thumbnail sketch of this thing and it’s… very crowded indeed.
Honestly, the experience of watching this bloody thing is like ingesting a dense fantasy series that the creatives involved have unwisely attempted to cram into a single 100 minute movie. And the reason it feels like that is because that’s exactly what they did! Ninja Wars is based on The Iga Ninja Scrolls by author Futaro Yamada, which itself was part of a book series made up of 30+ volumes. That means unsavvy audiences are getting all of the exposition with none of the context, leading to an experience that is fitfully entertaining and visually stylish, but also utterly bereft of logic, reason or any sense of why the events on screen are occurring. It’s both a frustrating and fascinating experience, but one that ultimately doesn’t quite work despite entertainingly ropey special effects and fight scenes that include a bloke who pukes weaponised acid.
Interestingly, Futaro Yamada’s work would again be adapted in 1993 with the far more coherent anime Ninja Scroll, directed by Yoshiaki Kawajiri. And Ninja Scroll would go on to be a major influence on 1999’s The Matrix from The Wachowskis. All of which is fascinating in a film geek kind of way, but none of which makes the actual experience of watching Ninja Wars any more cohesive. It’s an interesting experiment, and doesn’t lack for style, but when all’s said and done, it’s a mess.
The Blu-ray looks gorgeous, mind you, so if you’re open to a stylish misfire maybe Ninja Wars will sharpen your katana.
The Extras:
A robust bunch of extras here. There’s an audio commentary with action cinema experts Mike Leeder and Russell Wait, multiple international trailers and a chonky featurette titled
Chiba Law: a documentary on Martial Arts, Japan Action Club and Sonny Chiba, which features interviews with historians Mike Leeder, George Clarke and Matt Routledge, actors (Australia’s own) Maria Tran, Takashi Hara and stuntman Reuben Langdon.
However, best in show is Blood Stained Ninja Scrolls, a short but informative piece from historian Jonathan Clements, who digs into the historical context of the films at the time (and Akira Kurosawa’s scandalous shade at Ninja Wars’ producer!) and how much of the flick was based around real historical events (minus the ninja, magic and acid-spewing, of course). It’s a really engaging piece and while it didn’t make Ninja Wars any more coherent, it gave it some much needed background.
The whole package comes in an absolutely gorgeous rigid case with eight art cards, an A3 reversible poster and a 48-page booklet with behind-the-scenes material and essays. It also doesn’t cost the earth, which is always appreciated.
The Verdict:
Is Ninja Wars a good film? No. Even understanding the social and historical context, it’s simply too messy and incoherent to rate it highly. It is, however, striking, gorgeous and jaw-droppingly silly at times. Fans of ambitious disasters (or the very stoned) will likely have something approaching a good time.
Bundled with cool extras, in a very flash-looking box, Ninja Wars will thrill the small group of hardcore fans who already love it and leave everyone else profoundly bewildertained.
