YMMV / Ninja Assassin

• Complete Monster: Lord Ozunu is the ruthless leader of the Ozunu clan, a clan which takes in orphaned children and raises them as Child Soldiers by putting them through intense training regimes, where he routinely abuses them. Such abuse includes whipping them to the point of leaving scars on their bodies and forcing them to compete in brutal sparring matches where they beat each other to a bloody pulp, all for the purpose of making them the perfect ninja assassins. These assassins would go after their targets via black sand in a letter as a calling card, striking in the dark or dimly lit places killing not only the targets but anyone allied or unfortunate enough to be in the same room as the target as to leave no witnesses. Years prior to the film, when Kiriko had tried to leave the clan Ozunu had her captured and killed and nearly does the same to Raizo when he betrays him as well. During his final confrontation with Raizo, he nearly kills Mika by stabbing her where her heart is supposed to be, with a cold, apathetic look on his face.
• Critical Dissonance: Professional critics panned the film with a 26% in Rotten Tomatoes (though most of them conceded that the fight scenes were at least good), but perhaps as usual, Internet Movie Database gave it a solid 6,4/10 and many good reviews.
• Director Displacement: As with V for Vendetta, The Wachowskis wrote the script, yet James McTeigue directed.
• Moe: The way Kiriko smiles and acts like a Friend to All Living Things as both a girl and an adult make fans utterly adore her and want her to stay safe, which regrettably doesn't happen.
• Narm Charm: The movie at no time tries to be anything other than what it is: a nice over the top kung-fu action flick.
• One-Scene Wonder: Raizo's first target, an overweight cigar-smoking London Gangster, is Made of Iron and kicks the crap out of him bare-handed, all after getting knifed in the neck in the first moment of the fight.
• Signature Scene: The Europol cops turning into Men of Sherwood and fighting the ninjas on equal footing is a climax that even some people who never saw the movie have heard of or seen clips of. Those people tend to be impressed.
• So Bad, It's Good: A glorious example of martial arts cinema, complete with Ludicrous Gibs, nonsensical backstories about warring ninja clans, overdramatic angst, a fight in a laundromat that ends with a girl's severed head in a washing machine, and immortal dialogue such as "Plants don't have hearts." "Everything has a heart." "I don't."
• Spiritual Adaptation: Do you want to see a live-action movie based on the Ninja Gaiden series? Then look no further than to this film.

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