Cliché plot. Cliché characters. Ridiculously over the top gore and violence. That would be my summary of Ninja Assassin. Nevertheless, if you are able to look past these aspects you will have a blast watching. I’ve grown up playing video games such as Mortal Kombat, Shinobi and Ninja Gaiden so the story of the lone ninja who enacts vengeance on those who raised him but are ultimately corrupted/evil is nothing new.
Starring Jung Ji-Hoon (AKA Rain) as Raizo, he is raised by the ‘Ozunu clan’ from an early age and trained to become one of the most lethal assassins in the world. When he is only a young teen, he watches as a fellow assassin in training attempts to leave, only to be brutally killed for betraying the clan. Raizo’s portrayal I believe was done well considering there wasn’t much dialogue for him and his role was mainly to be there killing people while doing spinning backflips and other amazing acrobatics.
Now onto the more gruesome scenes. Shuriken (ninja throwing stars) are used a LOT. And after watching this, you might begin to believe that with enough practice using them, they are faster, more accurate and outright better than machine guns or other advanced weaponry, due to their ability to decapitate and chop off entire limbs. Throw in fast paced sword fighting, acrobatics and these strange looking weapons called Kyoketsu Shoge which are basically sharp blades attached to a pole that are swung around, and you have pure hacking and slashing entertainment.
A Ninja Assassin review cannot be complete without a mention at the CGI blood. It seemed to be everwhere, simply due to the many MANY people that are hacked up throughout. This was a slight let down; obviously fake almost to the point that it would fit better into an anime than a real movie.
Overall, not too good, not too bad. If mass killings are your thing you will like it, if you need a great story to stay entertained you could give this a miss. 6/10 from me.
No comments:
Post a Comment