I'm having increasing respect for the way Chuck Norris kicked off his movie career - he surrounded himself with good actors (this one includes Ron O'Neal, Clu Gulager, James Whitmore Jnr) and had a decent story. This one he's a cop investigating a drug ring and one of his fellow cops may be involved.
Norris steered away from karate for his first two films as star, but he makes up for that here - the character fights in tournaments and runs a school and the plot is him up against a mysterious other ninja.
There's some tropes so overused that it can't help induce laughs - like when Norris introduces a kid "who's like a son" he practically has "this person will die by the second act" tattooed on his end. There's some over the top "drug addiction" acting to reinforce the point that Drugs Are Bad. And at times the film feels like a blending of various movies (part martial arts flick, part serial killer movie, part cop film) rather than a cohesive whole.
But there's lots of action, Jennifer O'Neil gets to play a smart cop, the support cast is strong as mentioned. This is pretty good.
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