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October 29, 2021

New York Ninja

John Liu - 1984/Kurtis Spieler - 2021
Vinegar Syndrome Pictures BD Region A

A film like New York Ninja was probably never intended to undergo anything resembling serious film criticism in its originally intended form. The history of the film and its presentation does bring up some serious questions, even when the film itself is risible.

Taiwanese martial arts star John Liu had an acting career that began in 1977. He wrote and directed his first film in 1981. From what I gathered from IMDb, all of his films featured international settings. New York Ninja was Liu's fourth film as writer/director. At some point, the film production was abandoned. Liu's career both in front of and behind the camera seems to have evaporated. The footage to New York Ninja was found, with no available soundtrack or script. Kurtis Spieler edited the film first, then created a screenplay, followed by dubbing by some well known genre character actors. The question then is how much of this film what John Liu intended, followed by wondering if Spieler could have or should have done something different with the recovered footage?

The enterprise reminds me of two other films. For those with long memories, there is What's Up, Tiger Lily?, in which Woody Allen and his friends dub in their voices in a re-edited version taken from two Japanese spy films. This was done purely for laughs, although some of what was funny in 1966 has frankly aged badly. And Vinegar Syndrome, if any film is truly in need of rescue, it would be the original International Secret Police film by Senkichi Taniguchi and the source of Allen's spoof. I have to wonder if Spieler should have leaned a bit more into the silliness of the action with a more comic screenplay. The other film I am reminded of is Shark Tale due to Vinegar Syndrome selling New York Ninja based on the voice talent. Somebody at Dreamworks knew that kids in the lower rungs of elementary school would be clamoring for an animated spoof of The Godfather featuring the voices of Robert De Niro, Renee Zellweger and family favorite, Martin Scorsese. For New York Ninja, Vinegar Syndrome enlisted Don "The Dragon" Wilson, Cynthia Rothrock, Leon Isaac Kennedy, and Michael Berryman, among others to voice the characters as the stars of this film.

Liu plays a television sound technician turned avenger when a gang murders his pregnant wife on the streets of New York City. Liu seems to have been inspired in part by Walter Hill's The Warriors only with street hoods wearing masks, along with William Lustig's Vigilante and its presentation of lawless New York Streets. Liu dresses all in white, appearing at just the right alley or tree, performing acrobatics and even roller skating, taking down various criminals. Most of these criminals are small fry working for a guy with deformed hands that are radioactive. The street gang is not very bright because no one thinks to steal the camera from the two news reporters that follows them, even after the pair has been caught and cornered. Just on a visual level, Liu has actors entering the screen from the side of the frame, with death scenes that are protracted, and fights scenes that are unconvincing. Liu's facial expression of determination might be confused with painful constipation. Most laughable is the obvious waving of the rubber knife while stuck in a victim's stomach.

The voice work makes the acting, or more accurately over-acting, appear to be high school level. And this gets tricky to evaluate fairly because I have no idea what skills the original cast had, or if Spieler intended for the voice work to be part of an elaborate joke. My own impression is that even if Liu had been able to complete New York Ninja, it would still not have been even a "so bad it's good" movie. To put it in perspective, it lacks even the professionalism of Sho Kosugi's Cannon films, or the sense of its own absurdity as in a Troma production. On the other hand, I will not begrudge the audience that has its own reasons for enjoying New York Ninja. For this film, perhaps it is best not to ask too many questions.

Posted by Peter Nellhaus at October 29, 2021 05:20 AM