Ninja III: The Domination (1984) Cannon/Action-Horror RT: 93 minutes Rated R (strong martial arts violence, language, some sexual content) Director: Sam Firstenberg Screenplay: James R. Silke Music: Udi Harpaz and Misha Segal Cinematography: Hanania Baer Release date: October 12, 1984 (Philadelphia, PA) Cast: Sho Kosugi, Lucinda Dickey, Jordan Bennett, David Chung, Dale Ishimoto, James Hong, Bob Craig, Pamela Ness, Roy Padilla, Moe Mosley, John LaMotta, Ron Foster, Earl Smith, Carver Barnes. Box Office: $7.6 million (US)
Rating: ****
I don’t think I have ever seen a movie quite like Ninja III: The Domination. In fact, I know I haven’t. I’d remember it. It’s so weird, it should be shown at the Mutter Museum (right here in Philly!) instead of movie theaters. Directed by Sam Firstenberg (Breakin’ 2: Electric Boogaloo), it’s a combination of Revenge of the Ninja, The Exorcist and Flashdance with scenes lifted from Poltergeist and Tron. No, really. I’m not kidding. Allow me to explain how gloriously wacko Ninja III: The Domination is.
It opens with a mysterious Asian guy aka “Black Ninja” (Chung, The Ballad of Little Jo) entering a cave and opening up a locker hidden beneath a big flat boulder. It contains his ninja weaponry. Yes, a ninja in modern day Los Angeles! That hasn’t happened since Revenge of the Ninja. He shows up at a golf course to assassinate a scientist, his girlfriend and their entire security force. In the process, he also takes out roughly half of the LAPD as they attempt to apprehend him. He even manages to crash a police helicopter before it’s over.
The few remaining police finally manage to surround Black Ninja (who’s actually dressed in olive green, but no matter) and shoot him to death, but not before he kills a few more cops. Well, he’s not entirely dead just yet. He makes his way to a nearby area where somebody from the telephone company is hard at work climbing a pole and testing the line. The worker turns out to be Christie (Dickey, Breakin’ 1 & 2), quite possibly the most attractive person on the telephone company’s payroll. She spots the dying ninja from her high vantage point and goes to see if she can be of any help. She can, but not in the way she thinks. Before he dies, he transfers his spirit into her body. Now that’s what I call reaching out and touching someone.
Naturally, the police want to have a word with Christie about her encounter with Black Ninja. She wisely withholds the parts about the transference and keeping the ninja’s sword. One of them, Officer Billy Secord (Bennett), takes an instant liking to her. Too bad she doesn’t like cops. Not one to be easily put off, he takes one of her aerobics classes at a gym. Oh yeah, she’s also an aerobics instructor and a major ball-buster. Although amused by his tenacity, she still turns him down.
Here’s where we see one of the major side effects of the spirit transfer. As she leaves the gym, she spots some rough types harassing one of her girls. She tries to stop them only for the creeps to start pushing her around. She responds by kicking their asses ninja style. She kicks their asses real good! Billy sees this and arrests her for assault on the spot, but it’s just a pretext so he can get her in his car. She insults him again. He pulls over and gives her quite the earful. After this display of aggressiveness on his part, she is suddenly interested……in screwing him! They return to her big loft and do the nasty, using V-8 juice in a very interesting way. You gotta love the product plug.
Okay, so they’ve found each other and you’d think that they’d be happy. NOPE! Weird things start happening to Christie. Apparently, she inherited the Black Ninja’s memories with his soul. She can see the faces of the cops who killed him. In short, the bad ninja intends to use Christie as an instrument of revenge. It happens like this. The sword calls to her amidst smoke and glowing light. When she takes it, her eyes narrow and she completely zones out. She then goes after the cops. When she returns to her own self, he has no memory of what happened. When neither conventional medicine nor psychiatry can explain her blackouts, Billy takes her to a kung fu exorcist who determines she’s possessed after summoning forth the evil ninja’s spirit.
Meanwhile, an expert from Japan is called in by a group of elders (?) to deal with the situation. It’s an eye patch-wearing ninja named Yamada (Kosugi, Revenge of the Ninja) who had a previous encounter with Black Ninja when he killed his family. Determining that his evil spirit lives on in another body, he manages to find Christie and joins the cops in chasing her after she attacks a funeral for one of the murdered cops. Naturally, the chase climaxes with the good ninja going head-to-head with the evil ninja in Christie’s body.
It just occurred to me that I’ve told you almost the whole movie. It wasn’t entirely unintentional. Some movies, like Ninja III: The Domination, deserve this treatment. Even so, I don’t want to be a complete party pooper. I’ll just say that the finale takes place in a Buddhist monastery evidently set up for a big fight scene in which the evil ninja emits a beam of energy that hits the monks and makes them attack Yamada. Oh, just one more thing. We get to hear Yamada say, “Only a ninja can stop a ninja.” Where did we hear that before?
I have to say I really enjoyed Ninja III: The Domination, the third part of Cannon’s ninja trilogy. It doesn’t have anything at all to do with its predecessors except for the whole ninja theme. This one goes off the rails in a big way. IT’S FREAKING WILD! How else would you describe a movie where a ninja slices billiard balls in half with his sword? He also crushes one with his bare hand. I can only surmise that writer James R. Silke has either a great imagination or a great drug connection in order to come up with something this crazy.
Earlier I mentioned the various movies that inspired this insanity. I’d now like to call attention to two scenes most definitely influenced by two popular movies from the same period.
– A videogame in Christie’s apartment apparently comes to life when beams of light try to pull her into the cyberworld.
-As Christie is about to be taken over by the ninja’s spirit yet again, her closet door flies open and she starts to get sucked into the closet. She tries holding onto the bottom of her bed, but the vacuum is too strong and pulls her and everything under her bed into the closet.
Do you recognize the movies? Of course, you do. They’re TRON and Poltergeist. Yes, they’re blatant rip-offs, but when it comes to Cannon, ripping off popular movies is the name of the game. Look no further than either of the Allan Quatermain films.
Kosugi isn’t that much of an actor; he retains the same stony serious facial expression throughout. In other words, he performs at his usual level. This also applies to the display of martial arts he puts on throughout the movie. He has serious skills, but you already know that if you saw either or both of the previous Ninja pictures. I LOVE Lucinda Dickey! She’s appealing, attractive, agile and graceful. She has a winning smile and a great body. I miss she starred in more movies. Bennett is okay as Billy even if he’s reminiscent of Brian Backer in Fast Times at Ridgemont High. James Hong (Missing in Action) contributes an amusing cameo as the kung fu exorcist.
Overall, I really like Ninja III: The Domination a lot. It’s one of those so bad, it’s great titles. How can you not like a movie that has ninja action, evil spirits, aerobics, a hot babe, cheesy rock music, cheesier special effects and terrible acting? For me, Ninja III: The Domination is B-movie nirvana!
