Alicia I love this movie so much

Micitype Pretty Good

InformationRap This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

Logan By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

Comeuppance Reviews When the evil Mulgrew (Booth) and his Japanese "Red Faction Army" (actually a bunch of ninjas) plan to take over the world, Sean Davidson (Bradley) snaps into action to stop their nefarious plan. Even though he's working with compatriots Carl (Alexandre) and local doctor Sarah (Stille), Mulgrew still seems to have the upper hand. To get out of this jam, they call in the REAL American Ninja, Joe Armstrong (Dudikoff). He was off working in the peace corps (funny, that doesn't sound like the Joe Armstrong we know and love), but you know what they say, if you want something done right...call in the American Ninja. Now with the power of Armstrong on their side, they can't lose...or can they? At this point, the American Ninja franchise was on life support. Part 3 was a slog, so Cannon must have figured, let's get the same director and do it again. Bad idea. It feels more like a Nu-Image movie, and the fact that Avi Lerner and some other future Nu-Image people were working behind the camera shows this must have been their training ground, which is unfortunate, but explains a lot. One of the things they did right was get James Booth as the main baddie. Recall that this is none other than Limehouse Willie himself. But since Cannon recycles plots all the time, what they should have done is dispense with all the nonsense herein (like extra characters named Pongo and the pseudo-Mad Max trappings and all that) and do a remake of Pray For Death, but with Dudikoff in the Sho Kosugi role. Then we'd have something. But by now it was the 90's, and things were on the downswing. This movie feels like a cash-in with very little, if any heart behind it. Even Dudikoff doesn't show up until 44 minutes into the movie, and he was probably prodded into it.The connection between Davidson and Armstrong in the movie is done with the most slender thread imaginable, to the point of it being laughable: "they're friends", we're told. Okay. How come we never heard about this so-called "friendship" before? Just this one throwaway utterance is supposed to explain why Armstrong would come to Lesotho, Africa and save the day. We've heard of bad writing, but that's just childishly pathetic. And it's bad enough that Steve James isn't in this movie - the supposed main star is David Bradley, who has so little screen presence, he's more like a blank face than an actual actor. If he didn't have eyes, a nose and a mouth, and instead just had a big question mark on his face, no one would notice. Plus he makes a lot of silly noises when fighting, and he's almost certainly wearing "guyliner" in some scenes, which is not manly. Did Cannon REALLY THINK Bradley was better than Dudikoff? It shows that maybe this series deserved to go down the tubes, because of poor decision making.In the action department, there are some decent battles, a bit of jungle action in the beginning, and maybe a couple of exploding guard towers/falls and possibly a heli as well. Plus there's the Prerequisite Torture, but it's really hard to care about the characters, except for Dudikoff. There's the time-honored ninja training camp, featuring the al-Qaida monkey bars, and Mortal Kombat-style obstacles. But on the bright side, at one point, in order to change clothes from his street gear to full-blown ninja, Dudikoff jumps into what can only be described as a "Ninja Hole". When he jumps in, he's classic Dudikoff. A split second later when he jumps out, he's all Ninja'd out. We liked the Ninja Hole. Maybe it's near the Ninja Cave from Cannon's Ninja III: The Domination (1984). If there are spots on earth where people can instantaneously turn into ninjas, we want to know about them.As happened with American Ninja 3, not to mention a lot of other movies, the song here is better than the movie. Eddie Ray Wolfe's "Fight Fire With Fire" is great and should have featured in the movie itself, not just the credits. Chalk it up to another bad decision. In all truth, there is very little "Annihilation" in this movie. Despite the presence of Dudikoff, we're sorry to report this is a dud.For more action insanity, please visit: www.comeuppancereviews.com

Scarecrow-88 Plenty of white stuntmen in colorful ninja uniforms get pulverized in this fourth film in the "American Ninja" franchise, THE ANNIHILATION. Michael Dudikoff returns to the franchise after skipping out in the previous entry, but David Bradley(..who was the star of "American Ninja III:Blood Hunt")also comes back providing fans of the series with two heroes to root for as they attempt to free captured Delta Force soldiers, held for ransom in the fortress of a mad sheik and sadistic colonel who plan to send a missile into New York. Sean Davidson(Bradley)and his partner, Brackston(Dwayne Alexandre), a linguist, are assigned the task of infiltrating the fortress of a cruel former British soldier Mulgrew(James Booth) and evil Arab dictator ally, featuring an army of training Ninja who obey the sheik's every command. The Arab dictator is always ranting and raving about Allah which drives Mulgrew bonkers, but that's what you put up with if you wish to be a fiendish global terrorist. Soon Sean and Brackston are temporarily rescued by a kind Peace Corps worker, Sarah(Robin Stille)who uses her morgue as a hiding place. Soon, though, despite Sean's impressive skills, the trio are taken into custody and held in a chamber, their executions, along with the remaining Delta Firce soldiers, are planned for the next day. Former agent, Joe Armstrong(Dudikoff)is called upon to rescue them all, despite the fact that he retired from duty to pursue a more peaceful lifestyle alternatively different than his days as a ninja killer. But, understanding that his best friend Sean was also kidnapped, he agrees to take the job, going into hostile territory to engage the enemy, in an attempt to subdue his foes and help his people break free from certain doom. He'll need help in this group of Mad Max rejects, desert dwellers who have formed a commune under their charismatic leader, Dr. Tamba(Ken Gampu). With Tamba's people raiding the fortress and combating the evil ninja army, Joe will use an old ammunition tunnel(..supposedly dynamited)as a method into the place.Ludicrous action flick, easily the worst of the series. Dudikoff looks like he'd rather be elsewhere instead of in this movie. He doesn't even show up until like 50 minutes into the film;it was Bradley's show until then. The story is as ridiculous as you could possibly imagine and there are mountainous plot holes. As you often notice in movies like this, instead of killing such a threat as Bradley when you have him at your mercy, the villains allow him to live...even twenty-four hours before an execution has one scratching your head because why would such loathsome people allow him to live even minutes? Ninjas shout when they are shot, and as always in these movies, before a villain swings a weapon at our heroes he has to make a loud noise letting the opposition know he's behind him. Gosh, is Steve James' missing presence a liability..even if the plot is crap, he adds a good deal of pop to the proceedings. Robin Stille is lovely and sweet as a constant source of abuse at the hands of Mulgrew. Booth is perfectly fiendish and despicable as Mulgrew, building a bastard you can't wait to see beaten to the inch of his life. My favorite sequence, as completely silly as it is, has Joe catching an arrow in his teeth, stabbing it in the neck of a ninja! Bradley does get a chance to show of his flexible skills, but this turns into the Dudikoff show once he's imprisoned. I personally like Bradley, although his skills as an actor are limited, he has a likability to him. He's certainly more animated than Dudikoff who seems to be on life-support. The Mad Max group who assist Dudikoff are laughable and seem really out of place in this movie. It's quite clear throughout that Dudikoff's stunt double had a great deal of work in this film.

Wizard-8 If it wasn't bad enough in the previous entry where Steve James wasn't promoted to be the star when Dudikoff temporarily exited the series, the producers don't even call him back for this entry! Actually, upon carefully looking at the movie, it DOES seem that it was originally written for James to return; Bradley is given a sidekick character that you can easily picture James playing, and Dudikoff's character gets involved only when he's told that his "friend" Bradley is in trouble, even though there was previously no evidence they were friends - both being signs of a quick rewrite.I'm willing to bet that the reason James didn't return was his own decision instead of the producers - the movie didn't end up giving his role a whole lot to do. Also, the end results just aren't very good. Certainly, it's a notch up over the terrible part 3. For one thing, the production values are a significant step up. Also, the movie starts off very promising with a not-bad action sequence. But after that part of the movie ends, the movie quickly collapses. Bradley is again an uncharismatic lead (who fortunately is moved offscreen for much of the movie!), and Dudikoff (who finally appears halfway through the movie) seems alternately bored and annoyed to be there, though he is clearly more confident in his martial art sequences. There's also very little action, a very slow-moving plot, and some *unbelievably* bad editing. The climax does bring back some action, and also has a number of unintentionally funny moments, but it's too little too late.

Iridium-3 This film is in my top ten of complete and utter crap I might make it my life quest to obliterate its presence from the face of the earth.People who watch this film will emerge from the experience stupider and more confused than before Was this the film with ninjas on rollerskates? Or was that American Ninja 5 ? (Yeeeeccchh!!!!)