Ninja Please!

The moment we have been waiting for has arrived! Ninja Assassin is available on Netflix. We timed our returns so that they would be picking the next item from the queue just as it was released.

Ninja Assassin starts with Sung Kang (from Tokyo Drift and Forbidden Warrior) getting a tattoo with his gang. This is my wife's favorite part - she has a big crush on SK. After a cryptic warning, a blade flashes out of the shadows, and someone dies. To give you some idea of the level of violence we're talking about, the top half of his head is sliced off, to lie on the floor looking around like "what the - ?"

I won't tell you what happens to Sung Kang, but Mrs. Spenser almost gave up on the movie then.

Ninja Assassin is what we call a chick flick at chez Spenser. Muscular men doing muscular things, dressed to show off their muscles. In fact, she was out last night watching her private blu-ray disk of this with some buddies, while I stayed home and watched a serious documentary (It Might Get Loud, review to come).

The real star of the show, Korean popstar Rain, certainly fills the eye candy role. Amazingly, he has no martial arts training - he learned his moves choreography style in about six months. Of course, the computer animation helps. He just has to jump around; his animated weapons are bound to find their mark.

Playing opposite him are the law enforcement agencies slowly realizing that ninja assassins are afoot - then dying horribly when they get too close to the truth. The last one standing is played by Naomie Harris, who I know as the voodoo priestess in Pirates of the Caribbean. Interestingly, she is not playing a totally hot babe, but a researcher whose only martial arts skills are one Tae Bo class. But that's why this is a chick flick.

In conclusion, this movie is awesome. But it is very bloody. Severed-head-and-body-parts-in-a-front-loader-washing-machine-full-of-blood bloody. You've been warned.