Ninja 3: The Domination

Ninja 3: The Domination

1984

Director- Sam Firstenberg

Cast- Lucinda Dickey, Sho Kosugi, James Hong, Jordan Bennett, David Chung

            Ninja Hanjuro (David Chung) is dispatched on an assassination assignment. He completes the assassination but is pursued and eventually cornered by the police. After a long fight he is eventually gun downed by a squad of policeman.

However, before succumbing to his wounds he escapes. He is found by Christie (Lucinda Dickey) and unbeknownst to her, his spirit passes into her body.  The first thing Christie notices is that she has developed a real talent for kicking ass. She also has visions of the police that gunned Hanjuro down. However, periodically, Hanjuro takes control of Christie’s body and uses her to go out and take revenge. He is systematically hunting down the various policemen that killed him. The top man on his list is Billy (Jordan Bennett) a super annoying cop that has somehow become Christie’s boyfriend.

Christie is aware that something is wrong and visits a spiritualist (veteran genre actor James Hong from Bladerunner, Big Trouble in Little China, Golden Child, and a million other things). Another ninja, Goro (Sho Kosugi) is wise to what has been going on and is trying to stop it. He intercedes and manages to have Hanjuro’s spirit exorcised from Christie’s body so that he can be fought man to man.

This is a Canon film and that should just about tell you everything that you need to know. Canon specialized primarily in lower budget films, particularly action films starring Chuck Norris and Charles Bronson. Whenever they ventured away from this formula into other genres, the results were always interesting if bizarre. Though not a studio known for horror movies, they delivered two of the decades more memorable horror movies; Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 and Lifeforce.

The great thing about Canon was that there didn’t seem to be anyone in charge of quality control. While this often resulted in them making crap, it sometimes resulted in unexpected creativity because there doesn’t seem to have been anyone saying “You can’t do that”, like in one scene where Christie tries to turn her boyfriend on by pouring tomato juice on herself (???). Ninja 3: The Domination mixes so many different disparate elements together and does so unashamedly.

The character of Christie is an obvious rip off of Alex from Flash Dance, a mega hit that had come out the previous year. Whereas Alex was a steel worker trying to make her way as a dancer, Christie is lineman (linewoman?) who works at night as an aerobics instructor. The movie is filled with 80s cheese including Christie having an arcade machine in her living room, which for the early 80s would have made you one of the coolest people around.

It may be hard to imagine in our modern world where ninjas have thoroughly infiltrated all aspects of popular culture, but there was a time when westerners were just starting to learn about them. The 1980s was the Golden Age of the ninja movie and Canon made a lot of them. Along with the 5 films of the American Ninja franchise, Canon also made 3 films with Sho Kosugi; Enter the Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja, and Ninja 3: The Domination. The number “3” might lead you to believe this is a continuous storyline , but the films have nothing to do with one another, other than the fact that they star Sho Kosugi.

In the pantheon of action stars, Sho Kosugi occupies an unusual space. He never achieved the fame of other 80s American action stars, though Sho was probably the most legitimately skilled martial artists of the bunch. He never had the broad appeal of his Caucasian counterparts, but real martial arts enthusiasts always appreciated Sho.

Ninjas in those 80s movies were often credited with mystical, even superhuman, powers and this film is no different.  This plays just fine with the rest of the film which throws any idea of logic or restraint right out of the window.

Ninja 3 has become a cult favorite both among Canon movie fans and fans of bizarre films, but its real long term significance lies not with itself but in what it set the stage for. The director, Sam Firstenberg (who also directed Revenge of the Ninja) went on to direct American Ninja which was insanely popular during that decade. No video store worth its salt would have been without American Ninja on its shelves. This was Lucinda Dickey’s first starring role and  it is without a doubt what got her the lead role in her next film, Breakin’ (Ninja 3 was shot first but Breakin’ came out first because Canon was in a rush to be the first studio to release a break dancing movie).

If you aren’t a member of Generation X you probably don’t know about Breakin’, but it was an incredibly successful film that capitalized on the craze of 1984, break dancing. Lucinda also starred in the comically named sequel, Breakin’2: Electric Boogaloo (which was also directed by Firstenberg). To make the point of just how popular that film was, Breakin’ made more money in the domestic box office that year than Red Dawn, The Terminator or Nightmare on Elmstreet!

If you want something scary, or even coherent, you should probably skip Ninja 3. If, on the other hand, you want something fun with absolutely no regard for rules, then give this movie a chance.