Allen70 At the insistence of his American-born wife, Aiko (Donna Benz), Akira Saito (Sho Kosugi) decides to immigrate from Japan to the country of her birth to raise their two sons Takeshi (Kane Kosugi) and Tomoya (Shane Kosugi) and start their own business. Unbeknownst to his family, Akira is in fact a highly skilled ninja, who had faithfully protected the secrets of the temple minded by his adoptive father and sensei, Kaga. Years before, Akira's brother, Shoji - also raised and trained by Kaga - sought to steal from the temple in disguise, forcing Akira to engage him in battle and kill him. Akira's meditation on this matter is disrupted by an attack from Kaga to encourage him to wipe the guilt from his mind before it kills him. Akira announces his intentions to move to America to start a new life, and to put the shadows of the ninja behind him. Kaga makes him swear never to reveal the secrets of their sect, and gives him a ninja helmet as a parting gift, but reminds him he can never leave his shadows behind.The Saitos land in Los Angeles and meet with Sam Green, the widowed owner of a closed restaurant and apartment that Akira and Aiko planned to buy. After the sale is completed and the family visits the local mall, the cigar store area of the building is broken into by police Sgt. Trumble (Charles Greuber), a corrupt cop along with his partner Sgt. Joe Daly (Matthew Faison) working for local mobster Mr. Newman (Michael Constantine). Daly removes loose floor boards and puts a large white box underneath, containing the Van Adda necklace. However, he reconsiders and double-crosses the mob by taking tne necklace for himself. The next day Newman's enforcer, Limehouse Willie (James Booth), waits until the building is again deserted before entering himself only to discover the necklace is missing. Seeing Sam Green's packed luggage in his car, Willie incorrectly dedeuces that he's skipping town with the jewels and kills him even though he doesn't find them. Suspicion now fails on the Saitos.The next day, as Akira and Aiko enjoy the first day of business - "Aiko's Japanese Restaurant" - Tomoya and Takeshi go out to the local store and are confronted by local bullies eyeing Takeshi's bike. Tomoya - who has a red belt in karate - defends his younger brother and bests the bullies. But during the fight, Willie abducts Tomoya and leaves Takeshi with a broken nose when he tries to stop him. awesome if you can see it in it's entirely but unless you have it on a old Australian VHS tape forget about it i first saw this at a drive in just before I turned 18 and I loved it that real evil bastard really gets his ass handed to him in the end but I think Sho Kosugi was actually hurt in at least one seen a seen that gets edited in so called DVD releases be warned I still love it hay! its not Science fiction and it's no ET but what It has is intensity it shows if a person gets pushed enough that person can and will push back this is not a girls flick at all

Michael_Elliott Pray for Death (1985) ** (out of 4) A Japanese man (Shô Kosugi) moves his wife and two sons to America to start a new life but it's soon turned into chaos when a gangster starts terrorizing them believing that they have a priceless jewel. What we've got here is basically a DEATH WISH movie but instead of Charles Bronson we're given a ninja. This here certainly doesn't come close to the same level as one of the DEATH WISH films and I'd say it's no where near the level of REVENGE OF THE NINJA but fans of the genre will probably still have a good time with it. I think the biggest problem working against the film is that we've simply seen this type of story way too many times and outside the ninja stuff, there's really nothing new done with it here. We basically have a good-hearted man coming to America do to everything right but then he runs up against a ruthless gangster who just wants to kill and torture. It's pretty strange to see how much of the violence is towards the two young kids and when you see this you know you're watching something from the 1980s. The film certainly picks up some steam as it moves along and reaches the revenge aspect. The finale has Kosugi putting on the ninja suit, grabbing his sword and stars and going out for revenge. These scenes have a certain campy feel to them but there's no question that they're good enough to please fans of the genre. Kosugi certainly doesn't fit the profile of a "great actor" but I do think he did well enough for the part and there's no question that you're able to connect with him and feel for his situation. The rest of the performances are rather forgettable but they're good enough for this type of film. The violence in the film is all rather tame, although there's an uncut version out there that features a little bit more. Still, PRAY FOR DEATH is far from what one would consider a good movie but it has its own charm that makes it viewable entertainment.

madwand-2 Why is it so hard for a ninja to take on one white guy after wiping out an entire guard detail? I know this happens in all action movies, but this guy's supposed to be a ninja. Gimme a break.Also, when does having your half-American Japanese wife killed in the U.S. give you and your kids the right to reside there permanently? None of them are citizens.The old geezer ninja dude's makeup looked like it was applied by a 10 year old.Besides that, it's a really crappy movie too. That's why I just saw it on hulu.com for free...

HaemovoreRex Sho Kosugi dons particularly cool looking ninja togs in this fair martial arts actioner from 1985.The plot (of sorts) more or less resembles exactly that of Kosugi's earlier, superior 'Revenge Of The Ninja'.Similarly (and infuriatingly!!!) just as in the aforementioned film, Sho is yet again incredibly reluctant to get into his full ninja gear and whoop ass even after repeated attempts on his families life by the movies villains.However, inevitably and true to that staple cliché in these types of films, at least one of his family MUST be killed off thus prompting our hero to swear the obligatory oath of revenge. The bad news is that it takes until well over the hour mark before our man Sho actually gets his full ninja act together to get stuck in proper.Still, to be fair, the resulting action makes it worth the long wait and the villains invariably buy it in style at Sho's deadly hands and feet.The climatic battle between Sho's character and the evil (but ridiculously named) Limehouse Willy (played by none other than James Booth!) proves to be surprisingly evenly matched (a chainsaw being ostensibly a weapon that ninja are not specifically trained to defend against) but of course, such a repulsive low down, low life miscreant can only meet a suitably grisly end here and Sho certainly makes sure that he does!Whilst this isn't my personal favourite of Sho's movies, it's still a fairly enjoyable romp. If you're at all into the 80's ninja film craze then you could do a lot worse than to check this out.After all, nobody embodies the ninja better on screen than Sho does.