In the year A real-time adaptation of 1993's Super Mario Bros. He was so messed up by Nintendo that the video game giant was forced to stay away from the movie industry until the release of Detective Pikachu in 2019. Instead of an Italian plumber and a mustache hanging from platforms and gutters, we see Despair. Bob Hoskins on what looks like a ramshackle set from the Broadway musical production of Blade Runner . At least it cannot be called predictable. The movie Super Mario Bros. The animated version of the game by Illumination (aka Minions), is nothing short of what you'd expect from a Mario movie.
There's no better way to capture his comfortable mediocrity than to cast Chris Pratt as a simple, marketable face of heroism. Of course, Pratt is quite capable of the unbalanced performance Mario needs, having already turned into the awkward himbo elan found in The Lego Movie and Guardians of the Galaxy . But Pratt, who was here summoned, was an earnest and hired hero: "Come!" Like "Mamma Mia!" Provides strings. With an emphasis on contractual obligations and without a sign of the Italian language.
This Mario is a lazy businessman who doesn't believe in his father's "crazy dream" of starting an independent plumbing business in Brooklyn. He feels guilty for dragging his brother Luigi (Charlie Day, hilarious in The Lego Movie but spoiled here). Mario is joined by cold-blooded Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy) and Screaming Toad (Kegan-Michael Key) as they both bathe in a magical sewer that drops them in the middle of a magical mushroom kingdom. Help Luigi become the evil Bowser (Jack Black), escape from the mob.
The rest can be written according to the algorithm. Sister-in-law's ex-Peach has undergone a formal gender transition. The seemingly defeated moment when Mario runs into the fray remembering his brother's love, a scene that seems more suited to a superhero movie than The Plumber. And it's all illustrated by composer Brian Tyler's original game music by Koji Kondo, as well as the most iconic soundtracks imaginable. Bonnie Tyler should have been banned from using the phrase "catch the hero" after Shrek 2 , but here we are.
To the film's credit, it's certainly not as dull and unimportant as screenwriter Matthew Vogel's meager plot suggests. Many nods to Mario history are well represented: Koopa, Goomba and Yoshi, oh my god! – and "Mad Max: Fury Road" – there are beautifully executed sequences inspired by the popular Mario Kart games. It's hard to ask too much from a Mario Bros. movie. When their source is not a historical conspiracy, but should we not ask more than competition?
Directed by: Aaron Horvath, Michael Zelenik. Starring: Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Day, Jack Black, Keegan-Michael Key, Seth Rogen. 12,134 minutes.
The movie Super Mario Bros. It hits theaters on April 5.
