By Matthew Moorcroft

Weak Recommendation

• Directed by Kitao Sakurai
• Starring Noah Centineo, Andrew Koji, Callina Liang, David Dastmalchian
• PG-13

Third time’s the charm, I guess?

It’s impossible to walk away from Street Fighter without questioning exactly who it is made for. Both too inside baseball for non-fans and arguably too irreverent and loose with it’s source material for hardcore ones, you get the impression that the people behind this newest iteration are somehow in a street fight themselves with how to adapt material as chaotic and difficult as this. After all, there is no other game series as utterly strange and bizarre then Street Fighter, it’s large ensemble cast and ridiculous power sets that go straight into anime territory making it prime fodder for “unadaptable” in some ways. The 1994 film was loose in the sense of toning down the material to it’s detriment (even if it has some level of cheesy fun) and the stupidly titled The Legend of Chun-Li made the disastrous decision to focus entirely on backstory and avoid the titular tournament structure entirely.

This newer version, helmed by comedy direct Kitao Sakurai in his first blockbuster effort and with a cast of people mostly new to the big leagues or prominent character actors, aims instead as a full on, tokusatsu inspired, live action anime approach that almost never takes itself seriously, sometimes to it’s detriment. It is a film that is always at a thousand and when it isn’t it’s at a million, feeling much more akin pacing wise to a highlight reel of last year’s Wrestlemania. Mileage will certainly vary, and one could argue that it certainly isn’t by any metric “good”.

With a script this messy and haphazard, Street Fighter threatens to mostly just land with a thud, but thankfully that thud is lessened by a cushion of fun style and great performances from it’s otherwise dedicated cast. Much will be said about some of the stunt casting in this but while some of them are definitely stunt casting for the sake of it, there are a few like Cody Rhodes who manage to escape that and use their own quirks as performers to help embody these larger then life figures. It’s really the leading three that manage to be the highlights though, particularly a committed Andrew Koji who is both utterly charismatic, dryly funny, and wildly acrobatic as famed fighter Ryu, whose camaraderie with his brother is the beating heart of the picture.

But it’s not a Street Fighter flick without the fighting, and while there is less of it then you would think the bits we do get are well choreographed, well shot, and immensely entertaining. Much of this action is also found in the film’s stellar animated sequences, which are some of the film’s best moments and make you yearn for a full animated film like it. Even in it’s best moments, Street Fighter still can’t match it’s anime counterpart from over 30 years ago. But it’s not without trying either, as it’s manic energy is almost as high as something from animation with kicks and beams and impossible pile drives showing up without much in the way of explanation. If there is one thing good about Street Fighter is that it may have jokes, but none of those jokes are at the expense of it’s world and characters, which are played mostly straight in a smart decision to ground the film in some level of alternate universe realism.

The decision itself to play Street Fighter as more of an action-comedy then a straight martial arts flick is one that ultimately feels like it’s saving grace in the end. As a martial arts flick, it’s a little underwhelming, but as a stylish action-comedy with gorgeous set design and cinematography, it’s a blast of a time with friends and a couple of drinks to go alongside it. It’s a direct parallel to the recent Mortal Kombat films, which are stronger in the action department but are far more self serious about their material to the point of being, ironically, difficult to actually take seriously.

I’m not too sure if Street Fighter is successful. After all, it’s not really a flick designed to linger in the mind beyond just enjoying in the moment, but I would be lying if I said wasn’t wholly entertained in the moment by it’s lunacy and genuine bursts of laughter that I had either out of confusion or genuine appreciation for it’s technical elements. It’s a flick that will likely garner a cult following, that’s for sure, even if that cult following is mostly going to be fellow gaming fans who are just excited to see their jump cancels finally acknowledged on screen. Nevertheless, it’s a fun time, if in one ear and out the other.