CP Review 6/10/11

**eXD JIGSajW** Fri Jun 10, 2011 8:48 am

Previous Review:
Mega Man 8 (PS1)
https://exileddemons.forumotion.net/t636-cp-review-5-28-11#2727

CP Review 6/10/11 Gfhgfhlsmall

Mortal Kombat
(Brief Review)

Written By: eXD JIGSajW

Release Date:
August 18th, 1995

Rating
PG-13

Studio
Threshold Entertainment

Distributor
New Line Cinema

Genre(s)
Action
Fighting
Video Game Adaptation

Director
Paul W.S. Anderson

Writer(s)
Kevin Droney

Starring
Robin Shou
Linden Ashby
Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa
Bridgette Wilson
Christopher Lambert

Time Length
1 Hour 40 Minutes

CP Review 6/10/11 Gfhgfh-2

I first watched this movie when I was a kid back in '95. I was young enough to get suckered in by crazy ass special effects and flashy trailers....I was a stupid child... I don't hate this movie personally I think its the only video game based movie that kept to its roots far as plot and hollywood totally not fu*king it up since Ed Boon, Creator of the Mortal Kombat franchise, was supervising the whole project resulting the only video game movie to receive positive reviews and feedback by many fans and critics alike! That is a HUGE PLUS and that's extremely rare for a video game based movie! Also it had a KICK ASS SOUNDTRACK!!!

^^ personally I like this REMIX version a lot more ^^

~Here are my opinions and thoughts~

CP Review 6/10/11 MKscorpionmk

Plot:
If you played the first Mortal Kombat video game (or any other game for that matter) then you would get basics of the plot and know who the characters are already. If not here is the run down. Once every generation theres an ancient fighting tournament that's designed by superior god like beings, later named elder gods, called MORTAL KOMBAT. The combatants usually consists of people from Earth, in the movie its called Earth Realm, and 1 other dimension named Outworld. The tournament is hosted by an evil SORCERER named Shang Tsung and his evil band of fighters, who represents Outworld & winners of the past 9 tournaments.

Rules are if one of the dimensions wins a certain amount of tournaments, which is 10, he/she can rip open an gate and send the opposing opponents realm to another world called Nether Realm and merge the two together to burn and suffer for all eternity. Nether Realm is like hell..that's all you need to know since that's all there is to know. Outworld won 9 tournaments and Earth Realm is 0 for 9 so this means if they lose one more time then earth is doomed. But there is one elder god, named Raiden, that watches earth realm and will try and prevent earths pending doom. He chooses 3 fighters that he thinks are Earths only hopes of being saved and living another day. And that's it ...yup its that complex to those who never played the game but short. Like I said earlier they kept to their roots far as plot and they mean it! The plot moves pretty fast after all the introductions for the characters is presented. Another thing I want to say, with out giving any spoilers, is that everyone in this movie has little to no personality once oso ever and maybe few key little one liners here and there but then again...Mortal Kombat is all about fighting and only fighting and you will find a lot of that here and will not be disappointed. Honestly after you watch the first 35 - 40 mins you will forget the plot even exists in the first place.

Characters:

Lets meet the 3 main protagonists (good guys)....

Liu Kang- A Buddhist monk that abandoned his Buddhist ways due to the death of his younger brother that was slain by Shang Tsung. Now raged by vengeance he enters Mortal Kombat in hopes of getting back at Shang Tsung. (yeah sounds like the most over used plot device ever but just role with it)

Sonya Blade - An FBI agent who is also bent on vengeance on a criminal that murdered her late partner, Which later turns out its one of Shang Tsung's fighters, Kano. Is it me, or is there a lot of boring plotted vengeance here?? **SIGH** I guess that's how boring the human imagination can be since it needs every cheap ass excuse to have conflict in a movie but really why use the same f**king sub-plot for 2 people?

Johnny Cage- Now his story is kinda different..hes a washed up martial artist (slash) actor trying to gain respect from movie critics and fans that say his moves and fights are just fake and un-original. Well after all he is an actor ACTING in these kung fu movies..what kind of retards get mad at an actor for re-ACTING (I repeat...an actor ACTING!) some of the best martial arts?? ....what ever. After being approached by a legendary director, which is later found out to be Shang Tsung in disguise, who informs him about a world martial arts tournament and it could be his last chance at proving people wrong that his stuff is not fake and hes the best martial arts fighter in the world and later boost is EVER LASTING EGO.

Now for the antagonists (bad guys)....

Shang Tsung - The main villain and apparently the murderer of loved ones, according to Sonya and Lui Kang. He's an evil sorcerer that was once human and during the very first MK (mortal kombat) tournament, a few centuries ago, he was caught cheating and was punished by the elder gods. His punishment is rapid aging every few days and was supposed to die days after the curse but he found a loop hole where if he sucked souls from anyone he comes in contact with he keeps his youth and as a bonus, becomes immortal.....yeah some punishment.....I think the elder gods didn't really think this through. One more thing about him...hes a shape shifter, which means if he posses the soul of his current victim he can become that person and have his or her memories, personality, and fighting moves. Basically hes an overpowered sorcerer...go figure.

Kitana - Not much to say about her since shes one of the only 3 underdeveloped characters in the whole movie and does not have many lines nor not much is talked about when it comes to her past. But heres from what i can gather...Apparently she was a princess from a world called Ednia and her home world was violently taken over by Shao Khan, ruler of Outworld, and killed everyone in it. During the take over she was offered by her parents as a gift to spare Edina and spare their life's. So in return Shao khan kills the father and keeps the mother and Kitana. Wow...that was such a even trade there...maybe they shoudlve just offered cookies instead.... While being held captive queen Sindel, Katina's mother, took her own life not wanting to know of whats to become of her and her daughter. (BUT NONE OF THIS IS EXPLAINED IN THE GOD DAMN MOVIE). All they said in the movie was that shes a princess and shes over 3,000 years old....the end.

Sub-Zero - A fan favorite character they didn't really explain at all in the movie and if your curious of who this might be, hear is a link to his bio - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sub-Zero_%28Mortal_Kombat%29 - Honestly there's too much to talk about so I might save you the boredom of reading my boring ramble about his life.

Scorpion - ......(sigh) another fan favorite character that they were too damn lazy to introduce properly. Here is a brief. Scorpion is a hell spawn ninja that used to be alive many years ago but he, and his entire family and ninja clan, were murdered by Sub-Zeros clan and ever since then Scorpion swore vengeance against Sub-Zero to avenge his fallen clan members and family (yet another vengeance plot...my god...)

(Even though Sub Zero & Scorpion are sworn enemies they work for Shang Tsung and work together to kill to those who oppose Shang Tsung, this is becuase the 2 ninjas are under Shang Tsung's mind control and of course its never explained on how he did it, so lets move on.)

Kano - Well....not much to talk about. He's a hitman for hire that will kill for what ever target he's assigned to for and Shang Tsuang is his current client. He's responsible for many murders and many broken dreams including the life of Sonya Blade's late squad partner (who is nameless). Other than that hes an annoying Australian that doesn't shut up and never knows when to quit when it comes to his god forsaken one liners.

(every other character in the movie is either non important to the plot or just plain not worth mentioning since most of them get the axe anyway)

Now i did mention that the characters has little to no personality but you cant blame the actors but more on the writer's part for the dull dialogue. The acting was pretty solid (cheesy at times) but still everyone made their roles pretty believable and felt like they gave a damn while they were in production...unlike its horrible sequel...(more on that next time...)

Visuals:
The visuals for its time was pretty decent and superb (for '95 standards). The CG special effects for the scenery are just marvelous! (for its time). Outworld, Nether Realm, the temples, beaches & etc just looks pretty damn impressive if I should say so myself. As I was watching and paying attention to the scenery in each scene, I notice they also made them pretty damn identical to the video game counter parts, down to the orange rotten sky's in outword or the outfits and costumes for each characters that seems flawless and matches the video game fighters that the movie is based on. Everything is picture perfect far as visuals except for one thing...no graphic violence!

None of that is shown here and its disappointing since that's what the MK games are known for the most! (due to the stupid PG-13 rating). I guess they wanted to appeal to the younger audience since the director knows kids play Mortal Kombat more than adults did, so he tried to cash in as much as possible and they couldn't do that with a R rating that might lead to very low box office numbers since only 3 Mortal Kombat games were out at the time and wasn't popular as it is now...Also some signature moves are not shown like Lui Kang's fire balls, or Sonyas death kiss, or johnny cages green balls of doom. Only few and between signature moves are shown like scorpions spear (GET OVER HERE!), sub zero's ice ball, johnny cages nut punch (dead serious, the name says it all).
Over all i think the movie is average at best but for a video game based to only receive positive reviews and feedback, also being the only video game based movie to get mostly everything right. I say its a good thing and Its worth checking it out! Just don't watch the horrible horrible sequel. Hope you enjoy my quick (and brief) review and i didn't want to spoil anything so hopefully you might find the movie enjoyable as much as i did

Presentation: 7.0
Plot: 6.5
Acting: 6.0
Visuals: 7.5
Replay Value: AVERAGE

OVERALL - 6.8 (AVERAGE)

**eXD Phoenix** Sat Jun 11, 2011 7:37 am

You put alot of work into this. Lots of cool info. good job Very Happy

Lol I never peronally watched or played any Mortal Kombat Movie or video game.

**eXD JIGSajW** Mon Jun 13, 2011 3:54 pm

eXD Phoenix wrote:You put alot of work into this. Lots of cool info. good job Lol I never personally watched or played any Mortal Kombat Movie or video game.

thx man i really appreciate the compliment Smile

I decided to do a brief review and not give the whole movie becuase i want people to experience this movie with out having the spoilers in their heads Smile

Yeah if you never played the games its actually a good thing becuase if you watch the movie you will have a fresh mind and not see any continuity problems. For example, when movies are based off books and people get mad if they read the book first becuase the movie is nothing like that book lol. On a side note the games are not competitive per say, but their one of those very fun games to play with friends and do RIDICULOUS stuff (Like the early Tony Pro Skater Games and how you can ollie 100 feet in the air and spin a billions times while landing lol lol....GOOD TIMES)

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