Red Shadow:
Three childhood friends come of age in an era of war and strife. Trained as ninja, the three teens face samurai and rival ninja as they perform their duties for the good of their clan. With a lot of standard fan service, comedy, and heavy wire stunt work, the film sort of throws a few ideas at you with a very loose narrative. Mostly, however, the film just tends to sit there and bask in its own “coolness” that could have been meant to be more tongue in cheek than it felt. It’s got a cool fusion jazz sort of sound track mixed with techno pop, a lot of cheerful hand signals from the main cast, posing, and the movie just sort of rambles on and on with several plot points that only sort of feel wrapped up by the end of the film.
The very beginning of the film introduces us to the concept of a very special metal used in the design of Ninja weapons and armor, an idea that only briefly warrants a second mention later in the film and then goes on to have even less impact than the majority of the other plot points. Characters are introduced, disappear, and then reappear only to go away again by the end of the film without explanation or warning. We lose track of the heroes and villains, save for the films main character who seems to be a constant even if we’re not entirely certain who he supposedly works for half the time.
3 out of 5.
SUicide Girls Must Die!
Featuring girls from the website in an unscripted and elaborate hoax, SGMD! Features a lot of vanilla fluffy alt. girls posing for a calendar between disappearances. In what amounted to a significant portion of time from my day being devoted to watching this wretched piece of annoying junk, I was able to sit there with my mouth hanging open at the utter stupidity placed on display for what I guess is a demographic I could never fully understand. With all the trappings of your standard “Reality Show” stupidity, the SG’s bicker, cat fight, become panicked, and eventually turn on one another as cast members mysteriously disappear one at a time. We’re somewhat forced to identify with two of the girls as they become the focus of the camera’s attention, one girl having been placed in charge of model coordination and the other a model (Joleigh) selected for the shoot. The latter is an emotional wreck long before the end as the other girls tend to either ignore the fact that several girls have gone missing, or they are far too easily distracted by the shining lights of their pathetic calendar shoot. She’s constantly dismissed and verbally abused by the shoot’s “Photographer” so that she’s virtually drowning in a bottle when she eventually wanders off. She does show a small degree of intelligence, because she leaves with a group of the girls who decide it would be a good idea to take a boat back to civilization. The coordinator is an utterly incompetent fool who seems particularly picked upon by her supposed “friends” as they manipulate, torment, and ultimately feed her to the wolves in this pet project that I can only describe as a small accident on the side of the highway.
Supposedly “directed” by cast member Sawa, the film pretty much kills itself and doesn’t really need me to give it a bad review. This is standard soft-core fluff shots you’ll likely get from any sort of Calendar Shoot video package… from Sports Illustrated straight on up the roster of Calendar projects. Intermixed are scenes featuring the personal dynamics of dummies mugging for the camera in the “confessional”, scary sound effects for the establishing shots, and girls drinking too much. Rent any slasher film for more horror, rent sports illustrated for the fluff, or watch late night infomercials for GGW for the rest that this film attempts to offer.
1 out of 5.
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