I Want My Black Ninja and I Want Him Now!

  (wikipedia)

ENTER THE NINJA-1981-Cole, a newly inducted ninja (Franco Nero), goes to The Philippines to help his ex-mercenary friend Frank Landers (Alex Courtney) and his wife Mary Anne (Susan George) when corporate criminal Charles Venarius (Christopher George) wants his farm land because there's oil on it. Venarius has a wormy little German guy with a hook hand (Zachi Noy) and his gang bullies Frank's workers until  Cole beats them all up. When all his efforts fail Venarius sends a lackey to get him his own Ninja. He hires Hasegawa (Sho Kosugi) who trained with Cole and doesn't accept Cole as a true Ninja. Later Venarius (his name sounds like he should be an Egyptian mummy) has Frank killed and kidnaps Mary Anne. After killing him and everyone else, Cole has a showdown with Hasegawa. Guess who wins? 

Run of the mill '80's martial arts thing with a funny performance by Christopher George. Black belt/celebrity instructor/stuntman Mike Stone was originally cast as Cole but his acting skills weren't up to par so Nero (who's voice is dubbed) was brought in at the last minute. Two unrelated sequels followed. Kosugi later starred in his own movies. 

ENTER THE NINJA was directed by Menachem Golan who with his buddy Yoram Globus made many other movies under the Cannon banner until their break-up....

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American Actors In Italy

 

 

THE VISITOR-1979-At an Atlanta Hawks basketball game a little girl named Katy (Paige Connor) seems to make an opposing player lose the game. She's a snot-nosed brat and after having sex her mother Barbara (Joanne Nail) confesses to her boyfriend Raymond (Lance Henriksen who was in OMEN 2 the year before) that she's afraid of her daughter. It turns out Raymond actually works for a cabal led by Dr. Walker (Mel Ferrer) who says the mother carries the genes of “Sateen”. They want the boyfriend to impregnate mom so Katy will have a brother. For some reason Katy gets a revolver for a birthday present and she accidentally shoots mom who winds up paralyzed. A character who may be Jesus Christ (Franco Nero) sends a visitor (John Huston) to check up on Katy. And a weird housekeeper (Shelly Winters, no stranger to horror and exploitation) also hangs around. Meanwhile a detective (Glen Ford who had played Pa Kent in the SUPERMAN movie the year before) investigates until he is killed. Later after Raymond and Katy kill Barbara the visitor sends a flock of birds to kill Raymond and Katy is whisked away to a heavenly place where (now bald) she joins other hairless children under the protection of the Christ like figure.

This Italian/US co-production THE OMEN inspired tale was filmed in and around Rome by Guilio Paradisi (a former actor) under the more American sounding Michael J. Paradise. It's no paradise when viewing this disjointed, badly dubbed horror tale despite the name cast. It could be the US version was badly cut and dubbed making the story fairly incoherent. For example director Sam Peckinpah appears in one scene as a doctor named Collins (Katy and Barbara's last name). It seems in the uncut version it's explained that the doctor is actually Barbara's ex-husband but here it's reduced to a weird cameo by an American director (Peckinpah would make this last movie THE OSTERMAN WEEKEND a few years later). Actor/director Mel Ferrer was in several European horror films around this time and the same year as THE VISITOR was in added US scenes for an Italian horror film SCREAMERS.

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Out of Order Review!

Of course since this blog is messed up I have the review for the first installment of this series after two later installments!

WAR OF THE PLANETS-1966-A mysterious signal disrupts the New Year's Eve party on space station Gamma One. Commandeer Halstead (Tony Russel) sends a crew to investigate another space station where the landing party is alive but in a kind of suspended animation ("dead like lightening"...???). The landing party soon joins them. Lt. Jacowitx (Franco Nero,the same year he starred in DJANGO) and Lt. Gomez (Lisa Gastoni) help with the investigation and discover there is an invasion by aliens who are smoky green mist and take over humans. "It's a nightmare and we're all dreaming it...together". The aliens want to relocate to Earth and take over all humans. A lot of time is wasted on a ritual called "The Hosting". It's pretty boring but occasionally funny. Some fire extinguishers become deadly weapon's in the hero's hands. 

The sets and SFX in this Italian space drama look like something out of FIREBALL XL-5! Russel, Nero, Gastoni and Giustini had played the same characters in director Antonio Margheriti's THE WILD WILD PLANET the year before. Margheriti (usually credited as Anthony Dawson on US prints) had already made HORROR CASTLE (with Christopher Lee) and CASTLE OF BLOOD (with Barbara Steele) and went on to make many more. He died in 2002 at 72.

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The Wild Wild Review

THE WILD WILD PLANET-1965-In this crazy Sci-Fi space adventure from Italy, a mad scientist (Massimo Serato) is conducting mysterious experiments using human beings while strange aliens disguised as humans kill scientists (and little kids). Most are women have beehive hairdos but one is a bald headed guy with a killer trench coat! American born Tony Russel is Commander Mike Halstead in charge of the Gamma One space station where the action takes place. Lisa Gastoni is Lt. Connie Gomez, Halstead's kind of girlfriend. Franco Nero is Jake, another Lieutenant who helps Halstead go after the mad doc (who has some weird plan to create his own race) and rescue Connie who has fallen into his clutches. It's all very funny with toy cars and rockets, people turned doll sized, female aliens beating up men and lines like “You Helium head”. 

Directed by Antonio Margheriti, it's part of the Gamma One series of space movies. Ruggero Deodato (CANNIBAL HOLOHAUST) was an assistant director.

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