Bullet Points: American Ninja 3: Blood Hunt

Most action movie aficionados know American Ninja 3: Blood Hunt as the movie where David Bradley takes over the leading man role from Michael Dudikoff, who had appeared in the first two American Ninja films produced by Cannon. But did you know that it was Michael Dudikoff that brought David Bradley to the attention of Cannon executives in the first place? Dudikoff basically hand picked his American Ninja successor and didn’t even realize it.

American Ninja 3 was a huge break for David Bradley. Bradley’s career in Hollywood was short lived and to me his movies were always a mixed bag. For example, I loved Hard Justice but I couldn’t stand Blood Warriors. To me the success of a David Bradley film depended on Bradley’s level of motivation and the supporting cast he was surrounded by. If you had an unmotivated Bradley with a poor support system, you had a cinematic disaster waiting to happen.

But if you had a motivated David Bradley with a strong supporting cast, you had a movie like American Ninja 3: Blood Hunt…

• The Flashback: Our movie begins in 1979, where teenager Sean Davidson is a spectator at a martial arts tournament to watch his father compete. The tournament draws a sell out crowd and the attention of some very nasty people. Cue our villain, a man known as The Cobra (Marjoe Gortner). The Cobra orders his muscle, a guy named Andreas (Yehuda Efroni from Braddock: Missing in Action 3 fame), to go and crash this sold out martial arts tournament and steal all the box office money. This stolen money would help finance The Cobra’s evil plan to create a biological weapon that could bring entire armies to their knees (tickets must have been insanely expensive). In today’s world, he would have just set up a bunch of fake crowd funding accounts. During the heist, Sean’s father tries to intervene and Sean witnesses his father’s murder as Andreas shoots Daddy Davidson in cold blood. Sean is then adopted by his father’s trainer Master Izumo (Calvin Jung from Robocop fame) and as the opening credits play we see Izumo training Sean in the ways of the ninja and ten years go by in minutes.

• The Heroes: Sean Davidson (David Bradley) is now all grown up and an accomplished martial artist. Davidson is invited to compete in a tournament featuring the best martial artists in the world. It is at the airport that he meets fellow Americans, Dexter (Evan J. Klisser) and Curtis Jackson (Steve James reprising his role from the first two films). It doesn’t take long for the American fighters to bond and that is a good thing because Davidson is going to need all the help he can get. While the trio is out on the town after the first day of competition, Davidson witnesses what appears to be Izumo being kidnapped by a bunch of ninjas. He gives chase and while he’s unsuccessful in his attempt to rescue his Master, he makes a connection between the ninjas and the mysterious East Bay Laboratories.

• The Villains: The head of East Bay Labs is The Cobra. The Cobra is a bit of an eccentric, he loves holding Dr. Evil like meetings at East Bay Labs, where various evil characters gather (including the now General Andreas) for his progress reports. He also has guys wearing nothing but flesh colored thongs standing around in his laboratory (we eventually learn they are some sort of biologically engineered ninjas). For the past 10 years, The Cobra has been working on his biological weapon. The tournament was all just a ruse to get the strongest and most dangerous men on the planet in one place for a demonstration of just how effective The Cobra’s weapon is. If The Cobra’s virus can take out the best of the best, imagine what it could do to the average man?!  After one day of tournament action, The Cobra knows that Sean Davidson is the perfect test subject and that is why he becomes the prime target (that and he is the star of the movie). This sets up the inevitable showdown between Sean Davidson, the man who killed his father, General Andreas, and of course The Cobra and his deadly virus.

I’m not going to try to sell you on the fact that American Ninja 3: Blood Hunt is as good as the two movies that preceded it, but American Ninja 3 is not a bad movie. I think the movie does get knocked a bit too much, mostly by Dudikoff loyalists who blame David Bradley for taking Dudikoff’s spot, a spot I’m not convinced Dudikoff even wanted at that point in his career.

American Ninja 3 was a solid start for David Bradley’s action career and personally I would have liked to have seen Bradley flourish more in the industry. If you’d like to read more Bullet Points then you’ll want to check out the Bonus Bullet Points below…

• Politically Incorrect: Jackson refers to Chan Lee as a “ninjette” since she is a female ninja. I’m sure that could not happen in today’s politically correct world. Chan Lee (Michelle B. Chan) starts off on the side of evil, but as the movie progresses she teams up with our heroes after realizing the horrible things The Cobra has planned.
• If You Ever: …wanted to see some underwater ninja action, then this is the movie for you.
• Familiar Faces: The tournament aspect of American Ninja 3 does not eat up much of the run time, but in those scenes you may notice two familiar faces. First off is the referee in the tournament played by Mike Stone. Stone did a lot of stunt work and behind the scenes roles for Cannon over the years. But just one movie earlier, Stone was playing Tojo Ken, the evil ninja in American Ninja 2: The Confrontation… Sean Davidson’s first round opponent, Joe Simpson, was played by martial artist John Barrett from American Kickboxer 1.
• Brangelina: Marjoe Gortner, who played The Cobra, has an interesting backstory. At the age of four he was known as “The World’s Youngest Ordained Minister” and even performed a wedding ceremony. His first name is a mashup of Mary and Joseph and here you thought Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie was the first name mash up in history.
• If You Ever: …wanted to see a microlight land in the bed of a moving truck, then this is the movie for you. And if you want more information on microlights, click here.