Penn Team Takes First Prize in Ninja Film Contest

April 29, 2003

PHILADELPHIA -- A dozen students and alumni at the University of Pennsylvania have won the $15,000 grand prize in a competition that drew some 70 three-minute Ninja-themed films.

The contest was sponsored by videogame publisher Activision, part of its promotion of a new game called Tenchu: Wrath of Heaven. Entries were judged by producer Terence Chang and director John Woo, known for films including "Face/Off" and "Mission Impossible 2."

Members of the winning team are affiliated with Penn's Digital Media Design program, an undergraduate degree program that unites the Department of Computer and Information Science, the Graduate School of Fine Arts and the Annenberg School for Communication. DMD sophomore Joshua Gorin and 2001 DMD alumnus Neil Chatterjee spearheaded the effort.

The film's plot, developed by Chatterjee, involves a fight in a snowy cemetery between grave robbers and a Ninja. At its end, the Ninja fighting fades into a mock battle between two young boys, played by the grandchildren of a Penn benefactor.

From conception to completion, it took Gorin, Chatterjee and their team just 16 days to produce the film: six days of pre-production planning, half a day of choreography and martial arts training, three frigid February days spent filming in a Philadelphia cemetery and a final week of editing, including the placement of digitally created Japanese script on tombstones. The final result can be viewed at http://www.tenchuwrathofheaven.com.

"We were a bit nervous about filming in the cemetery," said Gorin, a native of Pittsburgh. "We devised a signal so that whenever we saw joggers or other people in the area, we would all drop our guns and stop whatever we were doing. I think most people would be kind of alarmed to see a bunch of masked guys running around a graveyard waving guns and swords."

In addition to the Japanese tombstone inscriptions, footage of a Ninja star whizzing through the air was created digitally. The film, tinted a chilly blue during the Ninja fight scene, switches to a warmer hue when the two boys appear. All the sounds in the film had to be created in a studio after filming was completed -- in some cases by smashing melons and other fruit.

Gorin and Chatterjee, who spent $700 producing the film and expect to use their $15,000 windfall to purchase movie-making equipment, were somewhat surprised to take the top prize.

"A lot of the other films obviously cost a lot more to make, came from Ninja experts or featured really strong martial arts skills," said Chatterjee, who has produced one feature film and two short films. "We're not even Ninja fans."

Additional information on Penn's Digital Media Design program is available at http://www.dmd.upenn.edu.