[Movie] Mortal Kombat, live action.

[Kathranis]

I love how they handled Hanzo and Bi-Han's backstory in this, in particular the casting and more nuanced depiction of their Japanese and Chinese origins. The martial arts, costumes, and set feel way more authentic, they're speaking the correct languages, etc. Lots of great little details.

Honestly, when they did the soft reboot in MK9, this is the kind of stuff I wanted. The games always played fast and loose with "oriental" culture with "Rayden," the "Chinese ninjas," and so forth. It's gotten better since the reboot, but it's still not the best. The series is fun and I absolutely adored it when I was a teenager, but it gets really stupid and adolescent to the point of self parody at times, which has kind of turned me off to the series as I've gotten older.

This movie seems to be going for a generally more grounded tone, which is what I've wanted to see in the series for a long time now.

That said, after watching the opening scene, my biggest concern is all the other stuff that the movie has to be about besides Hanzo and Bi-Han. Also worried that there might be some tonal whiplash when it gets to the characters basically going by pro wrestler stage names.

The Scorpion/Sub Zero look amazing but it kind of worries me that they would release that. Does that mean the rest of the film is garbage? Or are they just trying to hype people up?

It's generally the opposite. When a movie is bad (or at least when the studio is not confident in it) they will withhold footage and have embargos last up until the premier so that negative reviews don't get out.

The movie has also technically already premiered in other parts of the world, and the reviews are pretty mixed, but it's kind of hard to make heads or tails of them right now. Seems like some people don't like how much more grounded and serious this take is, while others are upset that it deviates from the games too much?

Personally, all I want out of it is good production design, cinematography, and choreography. The casting already seems to be really solid. I know the story of Mortal Kombat; it isn't the best.

[Dread Pirate Phayde]

Pretty excited to see this, that first 7 minutes was pretty good. Have my tickets for Saturday, but might end up watching it on HBO Friday night.

Also some MK humor.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

In a new interview with Variety, actor Joe Taslim revealed that he’s signed on for four more Mortal Kombat sequels to portray the iconic villain Sub-Zero, if Warner Bros. decides to move forward with the franchise. With the news coming days before the film is scheduled to premiere this week, it seems that Warner Bros. is hopeful that Mortal Kombat will finally break the curse of poor video game adaptations and launch a new series for the studio.

https://www.google.ca/amp/s/collider...-sub-zero/amp/

Seems like pretty good news story wise if the movie does well could mean we’ll see noob down the line.

[Dellis0991]

Pretty excited to see this, that first 7 minutes was pretty good. Have my tickets for Saturday, but might end up watching it on HBO Friday night.

Also some MK humor.

I'm dead! LMAO!

[qwerty123456]

[Greevir]

Also a gripe I have with western produced martial arts movies which is the cinematography and the amount of cuts and edits to them, and I see that a lot in this movies fight scenes, I hope it isnt going to be too much of a problem for me. :P

This was my take when watching the initial 7 minutes. The amount of cuts in parts of this fight were pretty distracting.

[Aurrora]

Oh FFS they used the worst version of Reptile.

[Greevir]

Movie was... decent. Some characters were great, some were wooden? Cole I felt was incredibly wooden and his acting was, idk, kinda bad to me. Kano was fun. Loved every bit of Hiroyuki Sanada, sadly there just wasn't enough of him. Fight scenes were okay, I guess. I kinda expected more out of them being a movie based on Mortal Kombat. Overall, a fun enough watch. Hopefully they can improve upon it with a sequel (since this is basically a prequel).

[Aurrora]

This was awful, the sole redeeming aspect of it was we got a Sub-Zero vs Scorpion fight.

Game mechanic gags in the fight choreography, is this supposed to be a comedy?

Sub-Zero is centuries old and working for Outworld for some reason. He also ends up being the "boss fight"?

Goro is a grunt character and used to bust Cole's cherry?

There was zero necessity to create Cole as the audience stand in character: Kano, Sonya, Jax were all as in the dark as he was.

The 1995 Mortal Kombat is the superior version.

The movie should have been given to the guy that did the Mortal Kombat: Legacy shorts.

[StillMcfuu]

It was ok, the OG is a better movie all around.
Somehow the casting was worse in this movie. Even outside of Christopher Lambert and Cara Tagawa basically owning the whole movie with unique performances. No, just the basic characters were boring and uninteresting where in the OG they got to ham it up and just be way more enjoyable.

I don't hate this movie, its alright for a watch. But its a perfect reason why you don't remake cult classic movies.

[Orby]

It was ok, the OG is a better movie all around.
Somehow the casting was worse in this movie. Even outside of Christopher Lambert and Cara Tagawa basically owning the whole movie with unique performances. No, just the basic characters were boring and uninteresting where in the OG they got to ham it up and just be way more enjoyable.

I don't hate this movie, its alright for a watch. But its a perfect reason why you don't remake cult classic movies.

As stupid as the original was it at least had recognisable characters. I still liked this movie too, but it lacked some relatability to the characters. Some of them were good, but my god was that lead not interesting. Even Liu Kang wasnt that interesting. I think the movie focused to much on what we wanted from the original movies (violence blood and a adult rating), but also forgot what we loved about the original too. 1 step forward 1 step back :P

[StillMcfuu]

As stupid as the original was it at least had recognisable characters. I still liked this movie too, but it lacked some relatability to the characters. Some of them were good, but my god was that lead not interesting. Even Liu Kang wasnt that interesting. I think the movie focused to much on what we wanted from the original movies (violence blood and a adult rating), but also forgot what we loved about the original too. 1 step forward 1 step back :P

I liked Kano in this one, granted he was just playing Boomerang from Suicide Squad; but then he wouldn't shut the fuck up and quickly eroded all that good will of finally being the only somewhat unique character.

They would have been better served keeping the series in past. They could have made up other characters without anyone caring. Anchor the story around Subzero and Scorpion throw in other characters that have more of a reason to be in the past *cough* Kung Lao. And at least if everything else was boring as fuck, it would have been interesting to see an earlier tournament. You know, make the movie different than the original.

[Orby]

I liked Kano in this one, granted he was just playing Boomerang from Suicide Squad; but then he wouldn't shut the fuck up and quickly eroded all that good will of finally being the only somewhat unique character.

They would have been better served keeping the series in past. They could have made up other characters without anyone caring. Anchor the story around Subzero and Scorpion throw in other characters that have more of a reason to be in the past *cough* Kung Lao. And at least if everything else was boring as fuck, it would have been interesting to see an earlier tournament. You know, make the movie different than the original.

Seriously Kano was the best part... So I stand corrected. He outshone everyone

[minkage]

Was an okay movie.

- Kano was hilarious
- Subzero and Scorpion were done justice.
- Sonya and Jax were actually okay
- Lui Kang and Kung Lao were terrible!
- Goro was completely wasted and its insane he is so weak... even punching a normal non fighter female does little to no damage.
- Cole was a completely uninteresting character and took all screentime away from the characters we actually care about.

Still enjoyed it and would love a sequel but the 95 movie is still more enjoyable.

[cuafpr]

average at best and the 90's MK movie is far better, esp the soundtrack.... Be interesting to see if it does well enough to earn sequels or if it's a one and done. The casting killed the movie really.

[Elkas]

This movie was meh, with a few good spots. I loved Scorpion, Jax, Sonya and Kano, but holy crap did they butcher Lui Kang and Raiden.

The 90's movie was, and still is, way better.

[TyrianFC]

Holy shit this movie was so stupidly bad.

It wasnt good enough to be in 'so bad its good' territory either, it was just stupid bad.

[ati87]

Was an okay movie.

- Kano was hilarious
- Subzero and Scorpion were done justice.
- Sonya and Jax were actually okay
- Lui Kang and Kung Lao were terrible!
- Goro was completely wasted and its insane he is so weak... even punching a normal non fighter female does little to no damage.
- Cole was a completely uninteresting character and took all screentime away from the characters we actually care about.

Still enjoyed it and would love a sequel but the 95 movie is still more enjoyable.

A good summary.
My guess is that the real problem with Cole was that he was kind of written as the generic white dude from the 90s that saves the day but this time he is Asian. The guy that's a late bloomer but once he finds his mojo he is the strongest member of the team.

It's a ok movie but not a (cult) classic, a 6,5-7 at best.
Make a Subzero vs Scorpion or the same overal movie but with Lui Kang and you can get a better movie. I understand the idea of having a fresh character without to much baggage but what makes MK great are some of these characters (even during the SNES era) and the way they look and there story.

[Wangming]

Oh my god. The final battle between Scorpion and Sub-Zero was the only thing not fucked up in the movie. That was like ten minutes of good stuff in a two hour movie.

-Kano was an overused meme
- Raiden had no personality
- Shang Tsung was a wuss
- Goro was wasted
- Cole was a waste of oxygen
- The idea of arcana was retarded
- The relationship of Bi-Han and Hanzo was changed to the worst
- We had a chosen one
- There was no Mortal Kombat

Granted this isn't live action Mulan so I'll give it a solid 3 out of 10

[Kathranis]

Really a movie of peaks and valleys. The first and last 15 minutes that bookend it were definitely the best parts. Everything in between is a real mixed bag.

Good:

• For the most part the direction and cinematography is quite good, though certainly not groundbreaking.
• Good score and sound design.
• The production design, VFX, and SFX are all excellent, especially given the film's relatively small budget.
• Fight choreography is good for the most part, depending on the characters involved.
• All of the performances are at least okay, but a few cast members do drag down the scenes they're in.
• Scorpion and Sub Zero are portrayed perfectly and their scenes are really well executed. Easily the high point.
• Sub Zero makes a great imposing villain, and they use his ice powers very effectively to build tension.
• I thought arcana was a neat way to explain their supernatural powers, making them a reflection of their personalities.
• Kano improved every scene he was in. Without him I the middle chunk of the movie would feel incredibly bland and boring.
• Jax, Liu Kang, and Kung Lao are all great, but underutilized.
• As an origin film, despite its flaws, it builds a solid foundation for a franchise.

Bad:

• Editing and screenplay are obvious weak points.
• You can feel the studio meddling with the "grounded" story centered around Cole and his family, which somehow feels tacked on despite being what everything in the movie is structured around.
• I didn't hate Cole, he's just a kind of bland everyman. They could have done more with him; imagine if they'd made him cool enough to earn him a spot in future games?
• Sonya has the same problem, IMO, and her motivations are weak. Probably the weakest performance in the movie, too.
• There's a lot of lazy exposition dumping and the characters are barely phased by the insanity around them.
• Plot is pretty convoluted. Lots of quick jumps between locations without much time to breath between scenes makes it feel rushed.
• Apart from Sub Zero and Kano, none of the antagonists get any plot development, or any reason for you to root against them. Even Shang Tsung is just kind of there.
• Goro in particular was wasted.
• The idea of Shang Tsung sending Outworld assassins after Earth's champions is solid, but halfway into the movie he just attacks Raiden's temple all out, and kind of ruins the pacing and flow of the movie. After that you get these weird mashed up fights happening in different places but edited to overlap one another.
• The scene in the void where Cole gives everyone a pep talk comes out of nowhere and feels like something out of Power Rangers.

Looking back on the movie, I really think it would have worked better if they'd just had the Outworld assassins attacking the champions all over the world while they try to find each other and figure out what's going on, eventually banding together to repel the attack on Raiden's temple after Kano's betrayal. Just cut out the shit where Raiden teleported everyone around.

I don't think Cole was entirely a mistake, he just needed more heart and personality. IMO it would have been better if his wife were the last Hazashi Hazashi descendent, and the arcana transferred to him after Sub Zero killed her. Something like that, anyway.

I suppose they could have also just made him a version of Takeda instead.

I don't mind that the movie is a prequel to the tournament, but Shang Tsung needed to be more of a menacing villain using his shapeshifting to deceive and pull strings, and they needed to build up rivalries and antagonists during the course of the film.

Now all the villains are wasted except Shang Tsung and Bi Han, so the sequel needs to establish more new characters from scratch.