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Canwest News Service
There's no denying the energy behind Ninja Assassin, the latest reel from V for Vendetta's James McTeigue. The movie bulges with action muscle and ripples with visual sinew.
Unfortunately, all that energy can't be contained inside the camera and ends up pulling the entire narrative apart limb by limb – as though a ninja-like villain were operating from within, slicing, dicing and splintering the story into a thousand shards that catch the light, but carry no lasting image.
It's frightfully frustrating because there's a lot to like about this highly stylized – if frequently incomprehensible – story about ninjas in the 21st century.
Starring Korean pop sensation Rain as Raizo, a young boy raised by a secret society of elite warriors somewhere in the mountains, Ninja Assassin tries to fuse modern day issues with ancient problem-solving skills – with decidedly mixed results.
Not that we can't relate to the story of two young men who start off as close friends, but finish ninja school as enemies when one is forced to choose between true love and loyalty to the morally bankrupt master.
Shakespearean rivalries generally spawn suspense and when Rain and co-star Rick Yune get together for a few roundhouse kicks and acrobatic flybys, the action adrenalin drenches the screen.
That's the "ancient" part of the yarn. The current day content comes from a completely separate James Bond-brand of plot where a secret society of power brokers has command over the elite army of ninja killers that allows them to remove political enemies without muss or fuss.
When Europol agent Mika Coretti (Naomie Harris) finds the money trail and follows the foul scent of ill-begotten gains to the secret clan of bloodletters, her life is on the line.
Making matters worse for the poor government operative: She doesn't know kung fu. She also has no idea who to trust.
Fate forces her hand, however, when she's saved by Raizo and decides to go after the big ninja fish before its too late and all the good guys are quietly removed from the playing field in a series of sound-effects-laden kill scenes.
From the sound of pointed stars sinking into flesh, sharp swords slicing through bone and the delicate whoosh of slight and wiry human bodies flying through space, Ninja Assassin gets more mileage out of the sound effects than it does from the visuals.
And frankly, that's just not a good sign for a movie banking on bloody combat for box-office potency.
The pay dirt should all be up there on the screen, where those of us who enjoy watching a martial arts extravaganza are counting on furious fists, cranky ankles and uptight toes to do the heavy lifting.
Akin to a musical production number when they're done right, high-budget action scenes with real martial art stars can be cinematic nectar because all the drama is distilled down into precise human movements that we innately understand.
There should be poetry in the action, but McTeigue's approach is entirely prosaic.
Where he could have slowed the movements down, he speeds them up. Where we should be able to read the actor's face in a moment of fury, we see nothing but shadow.
The action should have been the one element that brought this somewhat moronic, and frequently embarrassing, script together. It should have made us forget the bad dialogue and performances, but it's so disjointed and confusing, the movie simply implodes.
The result is a messy disappointment, not just from an action enthusiast's perspective – but for a fan of McTeigue, who clearly demonstrated an ability to inject a few philosophical vials into the veins of V for Vendetta.
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shutup your mouth…please respect all team (ninja assasin), until the movie comingup to the world cinemas in few days, and how respon people about the movie, don’t make it bad way for result…couse this hardwork from some people to influence hollywood movie, make have fun and fun to watch…RESPECT OKE DUD
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