Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990)

“For 15 years now, we have lived here. Before that time, I was a pet of my master Yoshi. When we were forced to come to New York, I found myself for the first time without a home, wandering thew sewers, scavaging for whatever I could find. And then, one day, I came upon a shattered glass jar and four baby turtles,” Master Splinter said.

This was the first time the Turtles on the Half Shell got a live action movie. It was dark and funny and also it wasn’t cgi turtles, it was real guys doing real stunts and real moves that made the turtles who they were.

I always recall reluctantly that I had to learn the turtles rap in high school music. Why would someone who teaches music use a rap to get the feel of real music, give me Williams, Goldsmith, or Horner anyday not a rap that is based on a cartoon show. I mean don’t get me wrong, I love the cartoon and I love the comic adaptions of the turtles. In fact even the current iterations of the TMNT movies is absolutely fantastic, but I digress. This movie is alot of fun.

The film was directed by Steve Barron and the music was scored by John Duprez. Now John Duprez isn’t known for a whole lot of film scores, but he takes it and runs with it.

Here is the basic plot…In New York, mysterious radioactive ooze has mutated four sewer turtles into talking, upright-walking, crime-fighting ninjas. The intrepid heroes — Michelangelo (Robbie Rist), Donatello (Corey Feldman), Raphael (Josh Pais) and Leonardo (Brian Tochi) — are trained in the Ninjutsu arts by their rat sensei, Splinter. When a villainous rogue ninja, who is a former pupil of Splinter, arrives and spreads lawlessness throughout the city, it’s up to the plucky turtles to stop him.

I was really surprised that Corey Feldman was one of the four turtles who actually did real martial arts in the film. Fun little facts make this movie a gem.

You can find the score on Amazon.

Would you like some clips?

Here you go…

Shredder’s Suite