The Super Mario Bros. Movie (April 7th UK)

[Ashley]

Just got back from seeing it

Spoiler

Not enough Yoshi 0/10

Least they seem to be fixing that in the sequel

I thought it was fun and in line with what I was expecting. Nothing cinematically groundbreaking but honestly if you were expecting that from this film why? But plenty of fan service, although I feel the musical references were much better than "hey, there's a visual reference" but simply because it requires more effort and I appreciate that. I did of course get a kick out of the visual stuff with the Hanafunda one being my biggest surprise. 

Kudos to Black and Taylor-Joy for putting the most effort in, and Key for not just using his own voice. But I think the biggest miscast was Armisen who I like but for Cranky it just seemed way too young. I'd expect someone more like Ed Asner if he were still alive. 

If I were to choose I wouldn't have chosen Illumination simply because their narrative style isn't really my kind of thing, but it was fine and as mentioned I went in with appropriate expectations. Their visual touches and attention to detail were good though, got to give them credit. 

Narratively my biggest gripe was they went to the Kong Kingdom and just...used karts everywhere? I know it was to set up the Mario Kart segment but given the DK games have a very distinct movement gimmick (well two, barrels and mine carts) it just seemed overly contrite but again not a big issue just "odd". 

Was glad Peach was the most fleshed out she's ever been and I'm pretty sure a little while back I was saying "why is she a human in charge of mushrooms" and we kind of got an answer! However on the flip side I'm going to hunt down some Italian reviews because oh boy was that stereotype dated when the games first came out, yet alone 40 years later!

And with Jack Black's Tenacious D background I couldn't help but think that the song was about 🍑

Oh actually that brings me to one last point; No Sleep Till Brooklyn was unexpected (both being the first song and not your usual choice) but the other real world songs were a bit trite. Had the "you can tell the age of the director" vibe to them. Plus no animated film should be able to use Holding out for a Hero as Shrek 2 owns that now. That's the rules. 

Overall, a great fun film if you love the games and a good film for kids too so in that regards they hit the target. I'm curious to see what they do next, so long as it has Yoshi. 

 

[BowserBasher]

Saw it yesterday and enjoyed it very much. My girlfriend even told me that she wasn't too sure going in but knew I wanted to see it and came out having enjoyed it.

 

Spoiler

One of the big complaints I keep seeing is that there's no story to it. Well to me the story was Bowser wanted to marry Peach, so he stole the star to get her to love him, sounds like a story to me. Anyway what were people expecting from this story wise? 

Also read one review saying the visuals were poor or something, well I'd like to see what they think are good as this looked amazing to me. character designs all fit perfectly in the world and I never saw anything that looked poor.

so the film itself, yes this is more than anything a thank you and aimed towards Nintendo fans and Mario fans. Does it make it a bad film, not to me. I felt the length seemed just right, too much more and I think it would have just been padding, I know people wanted them to flesh out characters and what not but I think this is definitely an introduction film and we are getting more.

I think I picked up quite a lot of the little references and easter eggs but I'm sure I missed a ton too. They even got the "Your princess is in another castle" joke in there. 

Voices, they just didn't bother me, once you're into the film it's nothing to complain about, yeah DK could have been a bit deeper in voice, but it wasn't terrible. Peach was fine, Mario and Luigi did what they needed. Jack Black as Bowser was the star though, perfect casting and that song was so unexpected but just fit so well.

Star of the film was possibly the blue Luma, just so out of place for a Mario game let alone the film. But it was funny. Close behind was the Blue Spiky Shell Kart/Koopa. Perfect representation of that thing, there really is no escape (well almost).

Did anyone see if there was a scene after the very end of the credits? I saw the mid scene with Bowser held in the bottle, and asked the guys at the cinema if there was another at the end and they said no. So we left. But I can't tell if by reading things that there was or not.

 

Great film for fans, maybe good for people that just want a mindless fun 90 minutes.

[Ashley]

There is a scene at the very end of the credits

Spoiler

You see a Yoshi egg, presumably the one that was on the gift table, in a castle room and it starts to crack then you hear Yoshi say it's name. You don't see Yoshi itself. 

 

[Ronnie]

Excuse my French, but that was fucking amazing.

[Ronnie]

To see 35+ years of Mario history given such reverence on the big screen, wow. No the film isn't Citizen Kane but it was never going to be. The storyline was perfectly fine for what this film is.

No complaints about any of the cast. Credit where credit's due, Chris Pratt did a great job. I thought Mario was perfect. Same with most of the voices tbh. Loved Toad (never in a million years did I think I'd hear the Captain Toad theme tune at the cinema). I take back what I said about Seth Rogen, he was actually pretty decent. DK in general was a standout character for me, great fun watching him and his rivalry antics with Mario. Peach, fantastic. Kamek, Luigi, list goes on. Charles Martinet playing Mario's dad, loved it.

The film is beautiful. Side-scrolling sections were incredible. Likewise the Mario Kart sequence, loved that one continuous shot. SNES Rainbow Road music gave me goosebumps. 

I was a little worried they seemed to be rushing through the plot really quickly as soon as Mario got to the Mushroom Kingdom, but as soon as they got to the Kongs that stopped being a thing.

Only negative I was hoping it would be a bit funnier. Some were good but a lot of the jokes were worth a slight chuckle but that's it. I've not really seen an Illumination film before though so from what I hear that's just kind of par for the course.

Going again next week.

[Ike]

The soundtrack is available on Spotify.

https://open.spotify.com/album/3QITNyRzvTqn0t9tLmS1Vd?si=EB3l8MJ9Qq64jcnMYixzkA

[Ashley]

Seeing them credit Iwata in the end credits was a really sweet touch. 

This however...

He has admitted that he has no idea if there's a legal requirement to do so (and some other game composers aren't credited so perhaps) but it still feels shitty. 

[Glen-i]

4 hours ago, Ashley said:

He has admitted that he has no idea if there's a legal requirement to do so (and some other game composers aren't credited so perhaps) but it still feels shitty. 

I'm gonna guess no, I booted up Smash Ultimate and checked the DK Rap credits, and it has a generic "by Rare" credit for the original song. And despite Grant Kirkhope being credited for the Banjo-Kazooie remix he did for Smash, all the other Banjo songs have the "by Rare" credit.

For what I've heard, that's more credit then the movie gives the DK Rap.

It's the sad state of video game composers, they're not given as much as respect as more "normal" music composers.

[Sméagol]

6 hours ago, Ashley said:

Seeing them credit Iwata in the end credits was a really sweet touch. 

This however...

He has admitted that he has no idea if there's a legal requirement to do so (and some other game composers aren't credited so perhaps) but it still feels shitty. 

I was looking for his name but didn't see it..

Speaking of the soundtrack:

https://www.iam8bit.com/collections/smb

 

Edited April 8, 2023 by Sméagol

[Ashley]

5 hours ago, Glen-i said:

For what I've heard, that's more credit then the movie gives the DK Rap.

It's just "from Donkey Kong 64" in the movie. 

[Ronnie]

Loved the Iwata mention in the credits. And a perfect role for Martinet to play too. I had no idea who he was until I saw the credits. 

[Glen-i]

2 hours ago, Ronnie said:

Loved the Iwata mention in the credits. And a perfect role for Martinet to play too. I had no idea who he was until I saw the credits. 

That checks out. Guy has range. He voices one of the dragons in Skyrim if I remember correctly.

[Ashley]

On 05/04/2023 at 11:33 PM, Ashley said:

However on the flip side I'm going to hunt down some Italian reviews because oh boy was that stereotype dated when the games first came out, yet alone 40 years later!

Can't find many but this did amuse me:

Quote

The scene in question [...] gives space to a father who speaks and gestures more like a caveman than an Italian. We are not surprised, nor indignant, by the ridiculous but sweet Italian-American accent of the two protagonist brothers, here reproposed where it is most exalted in the original version, while with the representation of Papà Mario things have slightly gotten out of hand. 

I think it's the phrase "gotten out of hand". 

[Ronnie]

Unsurprisingly, the film is doing very very well box office wise. 

Quote

To date, the film has the biggest box office of 2023, the biggest-ever global debut for an animated film, and the largest opening ever for a video game adaptation.

 

[killthenet]

I wonder how much of the profits Nintendo gets, given how involved Miyamoto was in the production they must have contributed to the budget in some way

[Dcubed]

10 hours ago, killthenet said:

I wonder how much of the profits Nintendo gets, given how involved Miyamoto was in the production they must have contributed to the budget in some way

Tales from my arse? I'd guess about 50%.  Given how much Nintendo has invested into Illumination and how they've let Chris Meledandri onto their board of directors? I'd imagine that Nintendo probably contributed 50% of the movie's overall budget; so they reap 50% of the profits.

[Ashley]

3 hours ago, Dcubed said:

Tales from my arse

Well that's the sequel title sorted

[Ike]

10 hours ago, Ashley said:

Well that's the sequel title sorted

I hear the sequel will be a reskin of another movie.

Source: My uncle is Miyamoto.

[Ashley]

25 minutes ago, Ike said:

I hear the sequel will be a reskin of another movie.

Source: My uncle is Miyamoto.

I heard the sequel in Japan is going to be a much more indecipherable version of the first while in the rest of the world it's going to be the Sonic movie with the characters digitally replaced.

(Just realised this was basically your joke repeated but oh well!)

[darksnowman]

9 hours ago, Ike said:

I hear the sequel will be a reskin of another movie.

Source: My uncle is Miyamoto.

They could reskin whatever Minions stuff they've got in the pipeline into The Super Mario Bros. Movie 2 + Rabbids.

[Dcubed]

27 minutes ago, darksnowman said:

They could reskin whatever Minions stuff they've got in the pipeline into The Super Mario Bros. Movie 2 + Rabbids.

Would be pretty ironic for Illumination to make a Rabbids movie when they ripped them off with the Minions in the first place.

[Ronnie]

The film is still a brilliant time the second time around, confirmed.

The only bit where I think something is missing is when Mario and DK are swallowed up by the Unagi eel. It feels like that was leading to a slower moment where they talked about their respective dads not believing in them etc, but instead it just kind of cut away to the action suddenly. Wonder if there was a scene there that got cut.

[BowserBasher]

38 minutes ago, Ronnie said:

The only bit where I think something is missing is when Mario and DK are swallowed up by the Unagi eel. It feels like that was leading to a slower moment where they talked about their respective dads not believing in them etc, but instead it just kind of cut away to the action suddenly. Wonder if there was a scene there that got cut.

Ive read this take elsewhere. It does seem like a couple minutes of them talking could have added a bit to that scene and cemented a bit more of a bond between them. Oh well.

[Ashley]

1 hour ago, Ronnie said:

Wonder if there was a scene there that got cut.

Maybe them realising their dads both had the same name. That's usually how conflicts are solved. 

[darksnowman]

22 hours ago, Dcubed said:

Would be pretty ironic for Illumination to make a Rabbids movie when they ripped them off with the Minions in the first place.

Bingo. Full circle.