New York Ninja (1984) - Lost John Liu Film is Finally Seeing the Light!

[Yihetuan]

Just now, saltysam said:

It was also quite sad to see how much Liu's skills had eroded from his glory years, a bit like a boxer way past his prime.

yeah I got second embarrassment watching some of his kicks and sword skills. It's a shame that some people who bought this will think that's the extent of John's skills.

[sifu iron perm]

Wow Vinegar Syndrome knew exactly what they were doing with this release. Brilliant.  This is on a level or superior to Tai's ninja spliced flicks. 

[sifu iron perm]

I had troma vibes watching this one. The school kids though? 

[jayholland]

Received mine on Friday 5th and watched it on Saturday 6th. Great release from VS, really impressive what they accomplished with the project and I found all of the extra features very interesting and well made. Here's a review I typed up for Letterboxd after my first watch-through (containing mild spoilers): 

 

Spoiler

Watched the Vinegar Syndrome region free Blu-ray released on November 1st 2021

The fascinating backstory of how New York Ninja came to be has been documented and discussed in most reviews here so I'm just going to jump ahead and give my impressions of the movie itself after a first viewing.

First off, the movie feels very authentic and grounded in its roots, despite being finished, voiced, edited and completed in 2020. Nowhere did it feel like a 21st century product, which is extremely impressive. No sign of crappy faux-video effects or filters, no overbearing self-referential genre nods and no semi-ironic ridicule - even though some of the characters are silly charicatures, the movie is playing it 100% straight and captured my heart with that. 

The soundtrack - from the awesome score by Voyag3r, the effects and foley work, to the dubbed character dialogue - fits the images very well, which goes to show how much Kurtis Spieler and the voice talent at work understand the material at hand.

I loved the idiocyncratic deliveries by Don "The Dragon" Wilson as the protagonist - the NY Ninja "John Liu"- complete with groans, panting and shouting of lines like "Whyyyyyyyy?". But the real showstealer for me was Michael Berryman voicing The Plutionium Killer: the outrageously over-the-top villian behind the kidnapping of New York city girls for a prostitution ring. Sensitive to light, he's wearing some kind of welding glasses and has a plutonium-poisoned-darts-shooting ballpoint pen for a weapon. Often in the back of his limousine meeting with his biggest client, he's being driven around by a driver named Rattail - a scrawny looking guy who bears a vague resemblance to Elijah Wood, but with a rattail that he puts in his mouth in a very menacing way whenever he's on screen (?!?). The Plutonium Killer is not adverse to getting his hands dirty himself though and often goes on the streets to boss around his goons. Another notable voice talent was of the Police detective, voiced by Leon Isaac Kennedy whose voice reminded me of Barack Obama's quite a bit. 

As for the New York Ninja himself - original director John Liu playing John Liu - I was actually a bit underwhelmed by his perfomance. The beige ninja suit looks anything but daunting and when he's in civilian mode, what he lacks in charisma he makes up for with plain awkwardness, which is so jarring at times that it becomes endearing. Only his incredible overacting saves the character and makes it fun. His encounters with the various thugs and gangbangers are quite fun though, as everybody is swinging around nunchucks and plastic toy guns and wait around to be shurikenned and asskicked by the New York Ninja. The final showdown with Rattail was kinda cool though, the actor displaying some real moves and actually employing "Drunken Sword Style". Unforgettable! 

The most impressive "character" of the whole movie for me however must have been 1984's New York City. With its iconic landmarks and locations like The Twin Towers, 42nd Street, Central Park, subway cars and stations, the Hudson river, ramshackle rooftops, backlots, alleyways, grafitti covered streets, crack-joints, a chopper hangar... the grime and decay of the Big Apple seldomly looked so raw since The Warriors equalling Combat Shock at times!

New York Ninja's overal action direction and fight choreography - despite John Liu being an accomplished martial artist and kung fu actor back in Taiwan and Hong Kong - are pretty much bottom of the barrel, save for a couple of pretty cool stunts. These are so few and far between to really make it amazing but I feel like this movie should be taken entirely at face value, together with all its flaws, to make it a thoroughly enjoyable experience that actually feels like 1984 direct-to-video action exploitation trash it, well, pretty much is for the most part.

Looking forward to re-watching it with the Spieler commentary track sometime soon!

Edited November 14, 2021 by jayholland

[Yihetuan]

@jayholland, that was an extremely well written review that encapsulated my feelings about the movie better than I can ever express via the written word. I felt the same regarding the nostalgia, landmarks and the way it was played "straight" as you put it. This film would've been unwatchable if they tried to play it up for goofy highjinks and cheap laughs.

[sifu iron perm]

3 hours ago, jayholland said:

Received mine on Friday 5th and watched it on Saturday 6th. Great release from VS, really impressive what they accomplished with the project and I found all of the extra features very interesting and well made. Here's a review I typed up for Letterboxd after my first watch-through (containing mild spoilers): 

 

  Hide contents

Watched the Vinegar Syndrome region free Blu-ray released on November 1st 2021

The fascinating backstory of how New York Ninja came to be has been documented and discussed in most reviews here so I'm just going to jump ahead and give my impressions of the movie itself after a first viewing.

First off, the movie feels very authentic and grounded in its roots, despite being finished, voiced, edited and completed in 2020. Nowhere did it feel like a 21st century product, which is extremely impressive. No sign of crappy faux-video effects or filters, no overbearing self-referential genre nods and no semi-ironic ridicule - even though some of the characters are silly charicatures, the movie is playing it 100% straight and captured my heart with that. 

The soundtrack - from the awesome score by Voyag3r, the effects and foley work, to the dubbed character dialogue - fits the images very well, which goes to show how much Kurtis Spieler and the voice talent at work understand the material at hand.

I loved the idiocyncratic deliveries by Don "The Dragon" Wilson as the protagonist - the NY Ninja "John Liu"- complete with groans, panting and shouting of lines like "Whyyyyyyyy?". But the real showstealer for me was Michael Berryman voicing The Plutionium Killer: the outrageously over-the-top villian behind the kidnapping of New York city girls for a prostitution ring. Sensitive to light, he's wearing some kind of welding glasses and has a plutonium-poisoned-darts-shooting ballpoint pen for a weapon. Often in the back of his limousine meeting with his biggest client, he's being driven around by a driver named Rattail - a scrawny looking guy who bears a vague resemblance to Elijah Wood, but with a rattail that he puts in his mouth in a very menacing way whenever he's on screen (?!?). The Plutonium Killer is not adverse to getting his hands dirty himself though and often goes on the streets to boss around his goons. Another notable voice talent was of the Police detective, voiced by Leon Isaac Kennedy whose voice reminded me of Barack Obama's quite a bit. 

As for the New York Ninja himself - original director John Liu playing John Liu - I was actually a bit underwhelmed by his perfomance. The beige ninja suit looks anything but daunting and when he's in civilian mode, what he lacks in charisma he makes up for with plain awkwardness, which is so jarring at times that it becomes endearing. Only his incredible overacting saves the character and makes it fun. His encounters with the various thugs and gangbangers are quite fun though, as everybody is swinging around nunchucks and plastic toy guns and wait around to be shurikenned and asskicked by the New York Ninja. The final showdown with Rattail was kinda cool though, the actor displaying some real moves and actually employing "Drunken Sword Style". Unforgettable! 

The most impressive "character" of the whole movie for me however must have been 1984's New York City. With its iconic landmarks and locations like The Twin Towers, 42nd Street, Central Park, subway cars and stations, the Hudson river, ramshackle rooftops, backlots, alleyways, grafitti covered streets, crack-joints, a chopper hangar... the grime and decay of the Big Apple seldomly looked so raw since The Warriors equalling Combat Shock at times!

New York Ninja's overal action direction and fight choreography - despite John Liu being an accomplished martial artist and kung fu actor back in Taiwan and Hong Kong - are pretty much bottom of the barrel, save for a couple of pretty cool stunts. These are so few and far between to really make it amazing but I feel like this movie should be taken entirely at face value, together with all its flaws, to make it a thoroughly enjoyable experience that actually feels like 1984 direct-to-video action exploitation trash it, well, pretty much is for the most part.

Looking forward to re-watching it with the Spieler commentary track sometime soon!

Brilliant review! You nailed it, basically covered every element which made this release  absorbent. 

 

[udar55]

On 11/6/2021 at 5:46 PM, Yihetuan said:

I can understand his reticence though. After the conviction in Spain, I'd be hesitant to show my face anywhere and would rather live out my last years in solitude and away from the public eye.

What does this mean? Conviction in Spain?

[Yihetuan]

11 minutes ago, udar55 said:

What does this mean? Conviction in Spain?

You can read all the sordid details here. Use Chrome or google translate.

 

[dionbrother]

It's also called "Being married to a French woman."

 

On 11/22/2021 at 9:54 AM, Yihetuan said:

You can read all the sordid details here. Use Chrome or google translate.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Yihetuan]

3 hours ago, dionbrother said:

It's also called "Being married to a French woman."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

What are you implying? Because John was married to a white woman, the authorities in Spain brought trumped up charges against him?

[dionbrother]

5 hours ago, Yihetuan said:

What are you implying? Because John was married to a white woman, the authorities in Spain brought trumped up charges against him?

Nope, it's a joke about the sleazy stereotype of the French.  Not sure what to believe about what happened to him in Spain.  I'd really like more sources than a translated blog.  It's a really wild story, made wilder by the broken english via google translate.  If he did serve time, it would explain his living off the grid in Vietnam.

[Cognoscente]

On 11/11/2021 at 9:31 PM, saltysam said:

It was also quite sad to see how much Liu's skills had eroded from his glory years, a bit like a boxer way past his prime.

It reminds me of the Jackie Chan caricature in High Risk.

I would have liked to have seen Liu and Van Damme in one of those French productions that Corey Yuen worked on.

[NoKUNGFUforYU]

I remember watching Zen Kwan Do in Paris in Chinatown and just feeling like something was really off. I like Tae Kwon Do, and I like women, but this just seemed like one big narcissistic vanity project. 

[Yihetuan]

11 hours ago, dionbrother said:

Nope, it's a joke about the sleazy stereotype of the French.  Not sure what to believe about what happened to him in Spain.  I'd really like more sources than a translated blog.  It's a really wild story, made wilder by the broken english via google translate.  If he did serve time, it would explain his living off the grid in Vietnam.

The blog directs you to actual scans of newspaper articles as sources (La Vanguardia which is one of Spain's major dailies and Catalan's biggest papers). The article states that Liu had an "accomplice" a Spanish man named Antonio Pérez Seguí who helped John Liu procure the "young fresh new acting talent" for his so called martial arts action films (which turned out to be cheaply shot porno films in Taiwan) and that Liu also posed as royalty, a prince of his own island to try to convince girls to marry him in return they would be granted royal status and ascension to the throne.

Edited December 9, 2021 by Yihetuan

[dionbrother]

5 hours ago, Yihetuan said:

The blog directs you to actual scans of newspaper articles as sources (La Vanguardia which is one of Spain's major dailies and Catalan's biggest papers). The article states that Liu had an "accomplice" a Spanish man named Antonio Pérez Seguí who helped John Liu procure the "young fresh new acting talent" for his so called martial arts action films (which turned out to be cheaply shot porno films in Taiwan) and that Liu also posed as royalty, a prince of his own island to try to convince girls to marry him in return they would be granted royal status and ascension to the throne.

That's a better link and pretty damning.  Obscurity serves him well.

[inframan]

Red Letter Media takes on New York Ninja!

 

Edited December 21, 2021 by inframan

[Killer Meteor]

On 12/9/2021 at 4:53 PM, NoKUNGFUforYU said:

I like Tae Kwon Do, and I like women

I never put that on my dating profile, maybe that's why I never got any offers...;)

[One Armed Boxer]

Better late than never with this one - I also got around to giving 'New York Ninja' a watch recently, and gave it the full review treatment over at COF. Check it out via the link - 

https://cityonfire.com/new-york-ninja-1984-review-john-liu/

[DragonClaws]

12 hours ago, One Armed Boxer said:

Better late than never with this one - I also got around to giving 'New York Ninja' a watch recently, and gave it the full review treatment over at COF. Check it out via the link - 

https://cityonfire.com/new-york-ninja-1984-review-john-liu/

 

10/10 for that review, be awhile until I get round to this title.

 

[Yihetuan]

Anyone who wants to pick up the soundtrack on 140g "plutonium killer" vinyl can order starting Wednesday at Mondo. Limited to 500 copies at $30 each.

https://mondoshop.com/blogs/news/new-york-ninja-original-motion-picture-soundtrack-lp-on-sale-info

 

Edited January 31, 2022 by Yihetuan

[nectarsis]

jumping into this for the first time....fingers crossed 

Edited February 4, 2022 by nectarsis

[starschwar]

An absolute gem of a movie.  I respect the ridiculous amount of effort that went in to not only finishing the movie, but finishing it earnestly, without trying to make it (more of) a comedy.  The Plutonium Killer is one of the most unique and enigmatic villains in any movie I've ever seen.  Such a bizarre array of abilities and eccentricities, with only the most scant hints at origin and motivation.  The most exposition we get is from an unreliable source, and it doesn't really explain much at all.  Such a delightfully strange film in so many regards, it really must be seen to be believed.  It makes the (admittedly finished) likes of Samurai Cop and Miami Connection seem relatively sane and competent by comparison.

 

That said, the deleted scenes raised some questions.  The movie has been consistently described as having been shot without sound - but there are clearly boom mics visible in several deleted scenes.  What became of that audio, I wonder?  The revelation that a script was found later on, but did not match the footage only perplexes me more.  Did John Liu revise stuff on the day of shooting, or was there a later draft that remains lost to time?

And while I do agree with most of Vinegar Syndome's Re-Director on changes made to salvage the film, the last of the deleted scenes should have absolutely stayed in - it's one of the most hilariously baffling things I have ever seen.  I'm very happy with the cut we got, but if they ever want to go back and do an extended version, I'm all in.

 

Spoiler

So when the Ninja jumps into the car trunk - Rat Tail was already in there waiting for him with an AK?  Why was he in the trunk?  Why did he not act during the entire drive?  How could the Ninja possibly have not noticed that there was someone in the trunk with him?

 

And then the multiple switcheroo.  Rat Tail aims the rifle.  Ninja removes the magazine.  Rat Tail taunts him (unaware that the mag had been removed?).  Ninja taunts him with the magazine.  No, joke is on the Ninja!  Rat Tail already removed the bullets from the magazine so that... if he got disarmed... he wouldn't be disarmed... because he'd already disarmed himself?  Which puts him in the advantage because... what?!

 

[ThunderScore]

Hello - it's been awhile but I wanted to say how much I enjoyed NEW YORK NINJA - the restoration, the new music score, the Kung Fu Bob cover art - it's the first time in ages that any new release has gotten my attention, so yeah! Also, just finished watching (NINJA) IN THE CLAWS OF THE C.I.A. -

 

[Coliseum1972]

Tony Liu mightve been a friend of Bruce Lee (somewhat) but i dont think John Liu was

Its always something : Goddard & Langella , both accused inappropiate behaviour , both worked on He-Man movie

[Cognoscente]

It's a shame that John Liu never did a movie with Taimak, who also had a shelved ninja movie. It would have been cool if they did an interracial ninja buddy movie.