Mortal Kombat (2021)

BlitzKrieg · 24-04-2021 3:00am

Ehh

Still think the 1995 film is better in the silly film fun area and this one is lacking in other aspects to beat it out. Both are visually atrocious, and while this one doesnt neuter itself with a pg rating the cgi blood is so awful I'd almost want it to be pg to get away from it. I liked what they did with Scorpion but it genuinely just struggled to tie it back into the main plot.

If I was to throw a 'genuine' criticism at it, then it would be the film has the worst editing I've seen in a hollywood film since Suicide Squad.

It's overall pace is overstuffed in the middle that the film feels like it's circling and rushed in the 3rd act.

It's moment to moment editing is shredded and very noticeably shredded, there is a very noticeable lack of establishing shots for scenes and there's a lot of character teleportation within the scenes cut to cut, from the first scene right to the finale. There's also a lot of shots cut very finely on the action, or very telling cut away's to bad close up vfx of objects to connect two disconnected shots (A scene involving Raiden is very bad for this)

But the absolute cake taking moment has to be the blink and you miss it half a second shot that genuinely feels like a mistake in the middle of a dialogue exchange between lue kang and Kano. That someone messed up on the timeline and this stray left over bit of a shot was left in.

Sonics2k · 24-04-2021 9:25am

This is a popcorn flick to it's core. I don't think the movie was made with the idea of winning awards or inspiring people to live better lives, but rather it's just a decent action flick with the standard story line.

It is entirely worth sitting through this movie for the

Scorpion v Sub-Zero fight scenes, because they are amazing.

Kano is a bit of fun, although it does get a bit samey with the character quite quickly.

I don't know how they did it, but Liu Kang

simultaneously looks like a 13 year old kid on the edge of tears, to a weirdly and overly muscular guy with hydration issues.

Weirdly, I feel like the original Mortal Kombat movie would have been considerably better than this, if it had today's special effects and budgets. Whilst the original was kinda campy and over-the-top, this one's downside is that it feels like it's trying to take itself seriously.

Overall, look this is a fun action flick to stick on when you want to watch people beat the crap out of each other and happily check your phone between fight scenes.

bradolf pittler · 24-04-2021 12:35pm

Would have been a much better film if they just Scorpion v Sub Zero as the main plot and threw in the rest around them.
The 1st 5 mins was great but it quickly went downhill from there and apart from Kano's brilliant foul mouthed rants i thought it fairly bland

android1 · 24-04-2021 2:15pm

glasso wrote: »

Fine paint-by-numbers movie which was expected given the source material

The refreshingly-written non-PC Kano part played by the Aussie actor was the most memorable thing about it

Fine to pass a bit of time but ultimately forgettable very quickly

The most memorable thing won't be that.
It will be the opening scene & the later Scorpion Sub-Zero fight.

Brief_Lives · 24-04-2021 3:14pm

holy moly , that was crap..... such a disappointment...

Sleeper12 · 24-04-2021 3:51pm

Brief_Lives wrote:

holy moly , that was crap..... such a disappointment...

Id be very disappointed if I'd paid money to see it in the cinema, that's for sure. For a free movie on the tv I thought it was ok

billyhead · 24-04-2021 4:12pm

I thought it was muck.

velo.2010 · 24-04-2021 5:20pm

Sold a pup by the trailer then?

clever user name · 24-04-2021 8:02pm

Lets put it this way, if 'Mortal Kombat', the video game, didn't exist, this would be the definition of a B-movie. Pure nostalgia, not much else.

dreamers75 · 24-04-2021 8:55pm

The fanboi in me enjoyed it for what it was.

Venom · 24-04-2021 9:26pm

velo.2010 wrote: »

Sold a pup by the trailer then?

Who ever cut that trailer deserves the Oscar for best director, as they spun mediocrity into pure gold awesomeness!

sonic85 · 24-04-2021 9:27pm

Damn. Reading some of the comments here is driving down my expectations massively. I'm disappointed already and I havent even watched it yet!

24-04-2021 9:30pm

clever user name wrote: »

Lets put it this way, if 'Mortal Kombat', the video game, didn't exist, this would be the definition of a B-movie. Pure nostalgia, not much else.

Any video game adaption is pretty much guaranteed a B-Movie result in terms of standard.

https://editorial.rottentomatoes.com/guide/video-game-movies-ranked-worst-to-best/

44 video game adaptations on RT, only 3 of the 44 rated decent

Also like B-Movies, they never get top-end budgets.

At least some B-Movies show innovation.

Not here.

It was watchable but instantly forgettable.

That was my expectation though so I was not let down.

velo.2010 · 24-04-2021 11:03pm

I watched it there anyway. Aside from the Sub-Zero/Scorpion fights, it is a forgettable film unlike the first which stayed with most people who saw it first time.

The actor who plays Cole is simply uncharismatic and his lack of dialogue is probably not a coincidence. Kano's Aussie actor was giving some rope by Aussie director Simon McQuoid to ad lib at various points in the movie. I think he went too far at times and it got a bit tiresome. Jax and Sonya were probably the strongest characters throughout the movie but underutilised and burdened with poor dialogue at times.

The less said about Cole's wife and daughter the better... simply atrocious acting there.

The undoubted highlight was the fight sequences between Sub-Zero and Scorpion which bookended the movie... somewhat ironically. This really should have been a Sub-Zero and Scorpion movie. Fleshing out their history and building the world of Mortal Kombat around them for the big screen should have been the priority.

Fight scenes could have done with better music and sound effects just like the first movie — in fact they should have just bitten the bullet and adapted those sound effects and more of the original soundtrack for this movie. The 1995 film outclasses it in this regard.

The movie is tracking well at the box office in the States, despite the pandemic, and is likely to do better than early forecasts. If it does get its sequels, they need to bring in better writers and sideline the Cole character.

Producers made the flaw of expecting complete newcomers to see this movie and building the narrative around the Cole character. Nobody who hasn't seen the first movie or played the games will be interested in seeing this movie. They risk losing fans of the first and the games if they keep with the Cole charater as the main story going forward.

My two cents FWIW.

mightyreds · 24-04-2021 11:14pm

I enjoyed it too as a mortal kombat fan but you really have to switch your brain off for it , the introductions for every character annoyed me, as mentioned the first and last fight are the best of the film but I did like kano he had some really funny moments. I also loved some of the catchphrases.

Edit: just to add I'll probably watch this about 10 times over the coming years I'm still getting mileage out of the original and sequel.

24-04-2021 11:29pm

Just finished watching this, loved it. Very happy as a scorpion fan, kano stole the show.

sioda · 24-04-2021 11:50pm

Yup enjoyed that great brain off enjoy the nostalgia flick. It flew time wise which is always good. Decent amount of head nods to the game overall 7 from me and would watch again tbh.

mightyreds · 25-04-2021 12:03am

Deleted User wrote: »

Just finished watching this, loved it. Very happy as a scorpion fan, kano stole the show.

Not happy as a Sub Zero fan

Tazzimus · 25-04-2021 12:25am

Enjoyable for what it was, given its based on a game of people beating the piss out of each other.

Coles a bit of a wet blanket and it dragged somewhat in the middle, but I've watched worse video game movies *cough* assassin's creed *cough*

Corholio · 25-04-2021 1:20am

Was disappointed at how cheesy it was even when you expect it to be a bit cheesy, but the really poor delivery of dialogue hampered a lot of the scenes. It seemed to be weirdly cut too in places, weird,fast transition cuts. You just kinda wish it was better for the sake of the franchise. Sonya, Jax and Raiden were as dull as dishwater, Shang Tsungs voice was great for the part but only ok at the acting. Kano's humour, while quite good, outstayed it's welcome with so much of it. Just frustrated at it really, with better actors it could have been very decent. Sanada is such a good actor, the scenes with him and Taslim were almost out of a different, better film. I thought the Goro scenes were pretty good as well.

Sounds like I'm trashing it I know, I enjoyed parts of it but it overall felt disappointing. It even felt like a 'small' film with the mediocre sets, it didn't feel like the realms and worlds it should.

Was even disappointed with the

Johnny Cage reveal at the end, once he mentioned 'Hollywood' they should have left it at that, because we all know what it meant but then just had to spoon feed with the poster too, it felt......misguuded

beakerjoe · 25-04-2021 2:52am

It was the best Mortal Kombat movie to date, but thats not saying much as the bar was pretty low.

The trailer is very well edited and makes you want to watch, I know thats what sucked me in.

But the film was not for me beyond a nostalgia trip. Disliked the Cole Young character and the acting from most was very hammy.

I feel that the story that was told was half assed.

Style over substance and if some ways the style didnt deliver.

It was ok for what it was.

Sudden Valley · 25-04-2021 11:59am

I enjoyed it. The first half of the movie was far superior to the second half but it had some interesting character, some good fights and some laughs. For a video game movie it was pretty good.

DrumSteve · 25-04-2021 2:10pm

I find it mental they had Sanada and Taslim in basically the two roles everyone who knows anything about Mortal Kombat knows, and decided not to build the film around them. 2 incredible actors.

tom1ie · 25-04-2021 2:41pm

I thought it was pretty entertaining to be honest.
I enjoyed it. Was never in the running for an Oscar but sure that's fine by me.

Roar · 25-04-2021 10:00pm

Absolute nonsense of the highest order.

I loved it.

mdwexford · 25-04-2021 11:01pm

I enjoyed it throughly.

the_syco · 26-04-2021 12:21am

Thrashy film, so I got what I expected. It's a B movie shot decently, with good CGI. Storyline wise, I prefer Monster Hunter, which was also thrashy. Reminds me of a film from possibly last year, that was also about SF or MK.
Slightly better than Godzilla vs. Kong, though.

As mentioned before; the scenes were cut drastically. Almost like they were given how long the movie was after it was shot, and had to literally cut corners to make it fit into said time.

Best thrashy film so far this year was probably Space Sweepers.

There are so many thrashy films lately, that I'll enjoy watching, but are not rewatchable.

Potential-Monke · 26-04-2021 1:22am

Right, I wasn't expecting the film to blow my mind, but I have to say that even I was disappointed with that. I'm gonna spoiler the whole lot just to be sure:

They kept going on and on about how good the fight scenes were, and how gory it is, and I think it fell flat (for the most part) in both those areas. The fights were meh at best, you could see them counting the moves and it just didn't feel natural. Even the Hanzo/Bi-Han fight wasn't great imo, and maybe I watched a different film, but the Sub-Zero/Scorpion fight was terrible at the end, helped in no part by having Cole in there. They should have got onto Iko Uwais and Yayan Ruhian for the fighting, the Raid films are the pinnacle and would have been perfect in a film about hand to hand combat!!!

And Cole, who thought he was a good idea? Descendant of Scorpion? All the lore available, and they make up this BS! He is a terrible character, with a terrible power and a terrible outfit. Not to mention he can't act, but that could also be because of the terrible character in general. Also, how did we get from Bi-Han a few hundred years ago, to a few hundred year old Sub-Zero working for Shang Tsung?! And making his outfit more black than blue, except for the last scene where you can see it's actually blue.

Sonya I thought wasn't great, like she was over acting. Jax was under utilised, and his "awakening" was a joke. Again, all the excellent lore and they make up this crap. They brought in Nitara just to have someone to kill, and I had to Google who the hammer dude was. Reptile was alright, but again making him fully into a reptile is stupid, and he wasn't anywhere near as good as the 1995 reptilian Reptile! No doubt we'll see the human form of him in the next one, if there will be one. Mileena was another unnecessary addition and not great.

Again, with all the lore built up over a couple of decades, they had to go and create this mess. If there is a sequel, they'll need to drop Cole, which I can't see how they'll do that now. I'll watch it at least once more, but I am quite disappointed. I was wiling to accept mediocre, but they couldn't even get that. I'm off to watch the cut scenes from MK11 again...

images?q=tbn:ANd9GcT9Vilv50JaMsIXyAcHt_t6GNbHfMbHlga_ChooAu8tBS_DtDVD1KGnZZGGMFO7z_x_ftc&usqp=CAU

images?q=tbn:ANd9GcT9Vilv50JaMsIXyAcHt_t6GNbHfMbHlga_ChooAu8tBS_DtDVD1KGnZZGGMFO7z_x_ftc&usqp=CAU

Scrap the whole thing, and give the licence and money to Kevin Tancharoen, he did a better job by miles.

homerun_homer · 26-04-2021 4:35pm

In that great words of Ian Malcolm "That is one big pile of sh!t". The whole thing looks and plays out like a well crowd-funded fan film that would go straight to youtube.

The main thing you need to get right in a Mortal Kombat movie is the fighting (choreography and stunts) and it is so flat and boring. The bad acting and plotting you would possibly get through for some great action scenes, but this is severely lacking and makes the whole experience bland and boring to watch. I nearly nodded off in the middle, and was nearly screaming for it to end already (or was that The Falcon and Winter Soldier finale).

The acting is quite terrible all round but I have to single out that actor playing Cole. He is blandness personified. Add to this that Cole's only characteristic is that he has a family. That's his defining trait. I thought the casting of Raiden and Shang Tsung was also very bad. If they are not going to fight at least cast someone who can ham it up. Shang Tsung arrives with a desire to look intimidating and it just looks like bad cosplay.

razorblunt wrote: »

I enjoyed this, it does exactly what it says on the tin. Nice nods to the game and some proper hardcore gore too.

Except there is no actual Mortal Kombat tournament for all the talk of it.:pac:

Penn · 27-04-2021 8:36am

The main thing I want to know is what direction was the actress playing Nitara given for how she's supposed to look/act. I've never seen such a range of combined emotions from second to second, most of which in conflict with each other, and none of which matching the scene she's in.

Mortal Kombat (2021)

Comments