Customer Reviews

Robot Ninja

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I am very fond of the campier of J.R. Bookwalter's films, and after hearing J.R. himself refer to "Robot Ninja" as the worst thing he had ever done in the commentary to the much more enjoyable "Chickboxer," I knew I had to see it. Unfortunately it is not currently available, but if you look hard enough decent used copies are easy enough to find. Mine appeared to have been played exactly once, and now I know why.

One of the appealing things about Bookwalter's earlier films is their relentless campiness. This movie has none of that (save an excerpt from the "Robot Ninja" television series at the very beginning of the film). It is dark, violent (although most of the effects, especially the self-surgery, are quite unrealistic), and generally ill-tempered.

The plot, such as it is, concerns a comic book artist, Leonard Miller (played by Michael Todd), who is upset at the direction the television dramatization of his masterwork, "Robot Ninja," has taken. There are pointed disagreements between Miller and his agent, Burt Ward (yes, that Burt Ward) about the subject. When Miller sees the murder of a young couple at the hands of moronic scumbags (played primarily by Maria Markovic, who appears more psychopathic than the rest of the villains, Bill Morrison, and James L. Edwards, who must have still been in high school when this was made), he decides to become the real incarnation of Robot Ninja, and to fight crime himself. He enlists the aid of strangely-accented Bogdan Pecic as Dr. Goodknight (they have a curious relationship, the backstory of which is never revealed) to make him the Robot Ninja suit. Over the course of the next hour or so mayhem and brutality reign in multiple encounters. Miller finds that vigilantism can get the Police involved in an unexpected manner, and that fighting real crime is harder than in the comic books. Probably the best performance in the film comes from Floyd Ewing, Jr. as a police officer, but as far as the quality of the performances overall, it is not a winner. Markovic is especially poor at her thespian skills. Fans may enjoy seeing Bookwalter as a thug in Markovic's gang, and "Chickboxer" co-conspirator Scott Plummer as a security guard. I won't spoil the ending, but suffice it to say that there are a lot of employment opportunities for mortuary staff in Ridgeway, Ohio.

The film is not enjoyable in the campy way of the "Bad Movie Police" series, and is not plausible enough (even as a fantasy picture aimed at young males) to work on any other level, either. I did give the film two stars for the presence of scream queen Linnea Quigley as a secretary, and Burt Ward from the old "Batman" series. I did enjoy the frequent references to the old "Batman" television show sprinkled liberally throughout; the closing credits also provide more entertainment than the rest of the movie. I greatly enjoyed the character names (like "Coleslaw," for instance), and found the amateurish closing quasi-rapping song about the adventures of the Robot Ninja strangely amusing.

This film would be more enjoyable as a DVD with a commentary with J.R. Bookwalter explaining (and sometimes apologizing for) what we were watching. Bookwalter is a talented guy (although admittedly not all his films show that off optimally) who has done much better since. I now perfectly understand Bookwalter's comments in the "Chickboxer" commentary.