#2,300. Cheerleader Ninjas (2002)

Directed By: Kevin Campbell

Starring: Kira Reed Lorsch, Angela Brubaker, Jeff Nicholson



Tag line: "They're out for revenge...Just don't ask them to spell it"

Trivia: This movie was filmed at Englewood High School in Colorado







The opening credits for writer / director Kevin Campbell’s Cheerleader Ninjas set the tone for the entire movie. Along with informing us (by way of captions) which character is gay, and which cheerleader will eventually show her boobs, we get a list of the film’s alternate (and ultimately rejected) titles, including Kick-Boxing Kennel Bitches in Heat.

So, right up front, we know Cheerleader Ninjas is a movie that won’t take itself seriously.  But even on these terms it never amounts to much.

A Catholic mothers group (led by actress Crystal Mikel) has come to the conclusion that internet “smut” is responsible for the downfall of morality in their small town. Believing the very popular cheerleaders at Happy Valley High are at least partially to blame (their gorgeous figures and provocative cheers arouse the passions of local boys, forcing the poor lads to seek out internet porn for release), the mothers recruit gay teacher Stephen (Jeff Nicholson) and ask him to put together a gang of Catholic school bad girls, who will then battle the cheerleaders and end their reign of sexual suggestiveness. In addition, Stephen teams up with the militant “Mr. X” (Donr Sneed), who has figured out a way to bring the entire World Wide Web to its knees.

Fighting for their survival, Happy Valley’s head cheerleader Angela (Angela Brubaker) and her crew join forces with the computer geeks, who, led by Maverick (Jared Brubaker), attempt to save the internet from total annihilation. Then, to defeat Stephen and his evil Catholic school girls, the cheerleaders trade in their pom-poms for swords and study the ways of the ninja! But will they develop their skills in time, or have they cheered their final football game?

Along with its steady stream of fart and masturbation jokes, Cheerleader Ninjas is chock full of stereotypical characters: the cheerleaders (with the exception of Angela) are all dimwits; the computer geeks wear Star Trek uniforms and jerk off uncontrollably; Stephen is flamboyantly gay, and wants to get back at the cheerleaders for refusing to let him join their squad; and the Catholic mothers are sexually frustrated housewives. Toss in a little nudity and the odd blow-up sex doll and you have a movie designed to offend everyone from homosexuals to Christians. But because the characters and dialogue are so over-the-top, the film isn’t so much offensive as it is silly, and that definitely takes the edge off of its comedy. In the end, I doubt any viewer, regardless of their gender, religion, or sexual preference, will walk away from Cheerleader Ninjas feeling insulted.

I did enjoy the brief American Beauty spoof (which featured Kira Reed as a “Fantasy Girl”), but for the most part, Cheerleader Ninjas failed to deliver the goods.