IFD Ninja collection

[kungpowmaster]

I think some company should collect all the best versions of these movies, and release them, with extras as the definitive IFD Ninja Collection.

Yeah, these movies are not top of the line, but they are great in the camp value.


I've collected a few, which were on some dvd sets I got:

1. Ninja Empire.
2. Ninja: The Protector.
3. Ninja Champion.

These are in the Kung Fu 20 Movie Pack.

and:
4. Ninja Killer.

In the Super Kung Fu Box Set.

Am I missing any more?

What's a list of USA available DVD of these IFD Lai/Ho movies?

Thanks,

Chosen One

On a somehwhat Ninja related, non IFD topic, I just sent off for Ninja Six Tai Seng box set.

[jethro]

The movies you have listed are easily some of the worst movies I have ever seen. THey are not even good for camp value. None can top NInja vs. Ninja though, that is teh worst movie ever. BTW- that Tai Seng NInja 6-pck is awesome. There is this one movie where the hero and villain from Shaolin vs. Lama team up. There is another movie where Jack Long pumps womens breasts in order to master the Yin Yang style. I also love Ninja vs. Shaolin GUards.

[jethro]

HEy Kung Pow Master, I don't really want to look up all the IFD ninja films, but I will tell you what I know abotu IFD and the mad genuis Godfrey Ho. It may not seem like it, but here is the brief verion.


Many people think that Godfrey Ho, Thomas Tang, and Joseph Lai are the same person. Not so. It is also thought by many that Godfrey Ho is not a real person but many do have stories abotu working with him.

Godfrey Ho is the very definition of hack. There should really now be a new word created just for him because while a guy like Wong Jing is a hack, he is brlliant when compared to Ho. Not only is Ho a hack of epic proportions but he is a big time crook also. There is a reason he became a milionaire. Probably a multi millionaire. He had a dream of making really REALLY cheap movies and the dream came true when he found literally thousands of undiscovered movie reels at a film studio he had just bought. One of the real Asso Asia classics is Shaolin Blood Mission with Hwang Jang Lee. All of the movies were dubbed in English by Ho and other people and he released more movies than you could ever imagine. They were all Korean and that is why you see the excellent Taekwondo skills from guys like HWang Jang Lee, Eagle Han, and Elton Chong and Benny Tsui were pretty good kickers too. Asso Asia also released many Dragon Lee movies and some Cassanova Wong stuff also. TO make piles of money on top of the money he already had, he started making some of the absolute worst movies of all time. I won't name any of the white guys that played the ninjas, because none are worthy of gettign their name mentioned. He probably spent 2 or less days shooting his 20 minutes of ninja footage and then spliced it in with another uncomplete film. In Ninja vs. Ninja, a white and a black ninja face off at the start and end and in between is a really weird horrible movie with Wilson Tong and Norman Chu. I have tried as hard as I can to erase the movie from my mind but I do recall Wilson Tong had sunglasses and wears the worst outfit in cinema history. Godfrey Ho really picked the weirdest movies to make his own. The guy is just plain stange. Once the 90's hit, he couldn't use any of his any of his old school Korean kung fu stuff and he couldn't show his modern day ninja masterpieces. Well, he could have, and he would have probably still made a profit, but Godfrey Ho does't settle for just average income. He actually started directing his own movies! After 20 years of ripping other people off, he actually did some good work. Of course none of it can really be considered good, but some, and I stress 'some' had good kung fu. My favorite from him is Undeafetable, but he actually did make some average movies with Moon Lee. It says on IMDB that Ho was teaching filmmaking recently. I can't even tell you how scared that makes me, but nobody is ever really able to confirm anything on the mysterious Godfrey Ho, so it may not even be true. And on that note, he may have actually directed some of these movies. Teh oddest out all of the thousands movies he supposedly made is Dragon On Fire. It has Dragon Lee, but it also has about 10 Hong Kong stars. His name may be listed on many movies, but HE never made a good kung fu movie. Dragon On Fire really does throw a wrench into everythign I just said, but I seriously doubt a guy could make 20-40 movies per year. It just isn't possible. An interview with John Liu, Bolo, or many others could clear this up real quick. It is crazy how much of a mystery Godfrey Ho remains to this day.

[Jimbo]

Interesting stuff.
I always knew Godfrey Ho was the inferior Roger Corman of Asian cinema. Some of his movies are so bad I can't imagine they were deemed releasable. The only two I like are Dragon on Fire (The Dragon, The Hero) and Enter Three Dragons...films so bad they are a treat to watch. Not to mention they are filmed in HK and not in Korea.

Sorry to go too far off the Ninja topic, but I'd be interested to read any interview with John Liu. This guy was a very interesting story himself. Unlike some info out there from Crash, Liu was actually born in Hawaii. His grandfather, Zen Liu, was a master of Tai Chi. At around 13, he went with his mother to Japan to learn karate from a Sensei Yano and won a tournament in Okinawa. He later went to Taiwan and supposedly learned from Tan Tao-Liang (this latter is mentioned by Tan, but when I read Liu's own story in a 1975 issue of Real Kung Fu magazine, this was never mentioned). He formed his own style, and to honor his grandfather, named it Zen Kwun Do. He taught in Taiwan for some years, then married a Frenchwoman and moved to Paris. He commuted between Paris and mostly Taiwan during his movie years (1975-approx. 1983), though his first movie was in 1972.

John Liu disappeared sometime in the 1980s. It was rumored he left his wife and daughter and went on the lam with American Express on his heels. Well, supposedly in 1998 he was a villain in the movie, Trinity Goes East, starring a Bruce Lee imitator from mainland China. So apparently, he must have taken care of his legal problems. In Taiwan, I knew a couple of people who knew him and others who had dealings with him. According to one source, at one point he had three wives simultaneously without them knowing about each other; one French (see above), one American, and one Spanish. Your can probably take this with some skepticism, but anyone who's seen Zen Kwun Do Strikes in Paris or Ninja in the Claw of the CIA can see he liked to use his celebrity to pick up the European ladies in his own self-directed films

I'd be careful about any movie with Ninja in the title, though there were some decent, bad but watchable "ninja" movies starring Lo Rei. My favorite Ninja-themed movie is Heroes of the East (a.k.a., Shaolin Challenges Ninja) with Gordon Liu and Yasuaki Kurata.

[kungpowmaster]

Hi,

Thanks for the info on IFD flicks and Ho. I have also done some net research. I guess I enjoy these movies, and what are considered bad movies, and see them in a different light, because ever since I was a young teen, I'm 40 now, I was always interested in independent film making, and fantasized being a film maker, of low-budget exploitation movies. Horror has always been my main genre, but when I see a movie like an IFD movie, I look at it more from the view of the person who is making this as a movie, through editing, dubbing, new footage, whatever, and I find it fascinating.

On the Ninja topic again, I'm still waiting for the Ninja Six, Tai Seng set to arrive, but I also just ordered, The Ultimate Ninja Collection, Vol. 1, 4 disc set, that has 3 parts of Venom of the Ninja, which from my net research must be Ninja Death, parts I, II, and III. I have Ninja Death 1 on that Kung Fu 20 Movie Pack, and I was impressed. Also in the Ultimate set, is Ninja The Final Duel.

Chosen One

[jethro]

Kungpowmaster- I was also impressed with Ninja death 1, but parts 2 and 3 are not very good.

Now Ninja the final Duel, that is a crazy subject. The version you will get will be about 90 minutes long, but robert Tai actually directed 12 hours of footage. Why? Because he is an idiot. I have heard that Soublblade may release all of the footage in a boxed set one day, but until then you can get Shaolin Dolemite, which is another 2 hours of final Duel Footage.

If you like Ninja the Final Duel at all, then Shaolin Dolemite is a must have. And make sure you get the BCI version, it has a bunch of deleted scenes.

And be sure to let me know what you think of Ninja Hunter and Ninja in the USA, those are 2 of my favorites.

[jethro]

Jimbo, Ninja in the dragon's den always pops into my mind first then thinking of chinese Ninja movies, but Heroes of the East is one of the best movies ever.

I wish I had more Liu info for you, but you seem to know a lot more than me. I can confirm that he is in Trinity Goes East with Dragon Shek. It is a bad movie, but it would be worth your time to check it out.

And I have never seen Zen Kwan Do or ninja in the Claw of CIA, but I definitely will some day.

[Jimbo]

Ninja the Final Duel is either bad, or so bad it's funny. IMO, the funniest thing about it is the cheesey dubbed voice given to African-American martial artist Eugene Trammel. Other bizarre things include the "flying ninjas" which are actually paper or cardboard human-shaped cutout dummies.

I almost forgot Ninja in the Dragon's Den. It is a must-see movie for anyone seeking out Ninja-themed movies.

The American ninja movies, like Enter the Ninja, Revenge of the Ninja, and Ninja III: the Domination are kinda watchable. Of the three, I'd probably say Revenge of the Ninja is the best of the lot. Ninja III is actually a martial arts-horror movie that tried to intermix elements of The Exorcist and maybe Poltergeist (and Flashdance?) with a ninja movie.

The American film that started the whole Ninja craze in the U.S. is definitely The Octagon. The Ninjas are portrayed as slow-witted bumbling morons, but before that movie was released in 1980, you never heard Ninja mentioned in American pop culture.

The first Ninja to appear in any movie released for a Western audience was You Only Live Twice (1967). I believe real-life Ninjutsu teacher Masaaki Hatsumi was even involved in the movie. The Ninja help James Bond (Sean Connery) in the final battle.

One of the better Taiwan Ninja movies is A Life of Ninja, or retitled Secret Life of the Ninja, starring Chen Kuan-Tai and Yasuaki Kurata. I think it was retitled and released on DVD by Crash Cinema sometime ago.

I realize none of these latter are of the type you were asking about, but thought you might be interested.

[jethro]

Shogun's Ninja is personal favorite ninja movie.

[kungpowmaster]

I was at a local used shop today, and didn't find anything in the DVD section, but then I looked at the clearance VHS shelf for 50 cents, and lo and behold, there was Rage of the Ninja, and Full Metal Ninja! What a great find for a dollar! These tapes have a great looking cover, all shiney and glittery. I never heard of the label they both are on, Imperial Entertainment Corp. I haven't watched them yet, the covers look great, and the tapes look pretty new, but the years on the back are 88 and 89, but I'm thinking thats the movies copyright and not the year these tapes were made. Anyway, I'll try and watch one tonight.

Chosen One