UK Film Review
- Jul 29, 2021
- 3 min read

Dancing Ninja Throwback Film Review

★★★

Directed by: Kelly Sandefur

Written by: Mitchell Klebanoff

Starring: David Hasselhoff, Lucas Grabeel, Bree Turner and Patrick Galleger

Throwback Film Review by: Rachel Pullen

Dancing Ninja (2010) Film Review

As we all know by now, the reason you come here is because I have in 411 on all the weird obscure movies, the ones you seem cool talking to your pals about in a sourdough bread place or morgue, the ones you can talk about and people think your hip and must be into art-house cinema or something…but you’re not, you’re reading this, and that too makes you somewhat hip.

But all this affirmation aside, this week I’m going to dish up a movie so crazy, so god damn obscure, so unknown that even you, my sourdough-scoffing loyal readers are going to fall off your chair…p.s I don’t know what sourdough is.

Dancing Ninja was actually conceived as the follow up to that lame movie Beverly Hills Ninja, which was…well lame, so I didn’t have high hopes for a film called Dancing Ninja, but the Hoff is in it, and he is a hot daddy, so I was ready to give it a go.

Dancing Ninja follows the story of a young boy called Ikki who is found washed up in a harbour in a chest, eating a baguette as a baby, (just google that scene, it's amazing) and so is raised by his new Asian parents in Asia…that is all we know, and despite being there from birth he has a lovely American accent and only speaks English, and everyone is cool with it…moving on.

He wants to do kung fu or something so joins a kung fu class but sucks, so instead of putting in the time there, he learns to dance on one of those Japanese dance machines and then uses those skills to help him fight…yup, it is going to get worse, this is the bit that makes sense.

So Ikki thinks he is the legend of the Dancing Ninja he has heard about, and when his kung fu master is killed by the Hoff, who wants to do evil things, Ikki goes to California to avenge him, because you know…dancing legend.

One of Ikki's classmates tags along as he is terrible and she has a level of competency about her, and they have dance-offs at clubs, and pal around together…oh yeah, forgot that Ikki’s Asian parents make porn and before he left the dad was like if you get laid you will be a better ninja, so with this in mind Ikki is super trying to bone his travel pal…Jesus.

He finds if he grabs her boobs that he can contact his dead kung fu master and seek guidance on how to stop the Hoff doing evil stuff, at this point he wants to blow up celebrities…fine, all the best celebrities were in 1998 anyway so see if I care, but that is not the point…the point is this film has several scenes where he has to grab her boobs…the actor from High School Musical is now copping a feel in order to transcend into a meditative state to talk to his master about the Hoff, who wants to kill celebrities, who he wants to defeat with dancing...ow, this movie is a pain in my brain.

Anyway, they both get caught in a net at one point and they decided to bone, and as they do he does these weird thrusting actions and lights come from his groin, and he like levels up or something and has better ninja powers from then on…again, this is the kid from High School Musical, in what appears to be a film marketed as family viewing…moving on.

They defeat the Hoff, they’re happy, they bone again…the end, and I die inside, because what is this movie? You think it’s for kids then people are making porn, cupping boobs, there are dance sequences and the Hoff is wearing speedos and thrusting at my face. I don’t even think the filmmakers knew at that point, they were just like…more sex puns and ACTION, there are plot holes, loads of them, scrolls that are never mentioned after being portrayed as important, people wearing wigs but then not, but then wearing them again. Chaos.

But what I can say is this, the acting is good, there are some actual laugh out loud moments that were intended, and although it is madness on every other level, this is one of those movies that people watch because it's so bad that it's good, and I can only imagine in a few years this is going to be like that movie The Room, because it, like that, is bonkers.

So, this week we have learned: