MOVIE REVIEW: Super Mario Brothers (1993)

As one of the first few video games I ever played and loved, it shocked me that I never actually had a chance to see Super Mario Bros. - the movie. I understand that there was probably a good reason why: SMB is a confused, muddled mess of a flick that somehow manages to be entertaining for all it's B-movie trappings. It's such a departure from what the film should have portrayed, that one wonders what the producers were thinking. It's not exactly a re-imagining, or a direct-transaltion. And there's some pretty cool effects that actually justify some marginally substantial production values, yet one wonders why they didn't go the extra mile? Oh well, it is what it is, and what it is, is, well...

When dinosaurs disappeared from the Earth, the meteor that caused it actually sent them to a different dimension. In this dimension, the dinosaurs evolved to become sentient, and even resembled humans (huh?). They also dominated another sentient species descended from fungi (...huh?), with the help of dictator King Koopa. The Mushroom King sent his only daughter, Princess Daisy, into the humans dimension, and she grew up in a relatively normal existence. Meanwhile, Daisy somehow befriends two Brooklyn plumber brothers named Mario and Luigi. When Koopa orders Daisy's capture, the lovestruck Luigi (...does not compute) and the sarcastic Mario chase down Koopa into his own dimension to get her back.

So, it sounds like your typical SMB plot, the problem is, the film's tone is scattered all over the place - it's too dark to be a kid's movie, and too stupid for teenagers and adults to legitimately enjoy. And the production values; they range from terrible to somewhat interesting, but they're honestly no better than a Nickelodeon TV movie. I think the only smart choice the producers made was to scale back the video game aspects, in order to compensate for their (somewhat dubious) creativity around the budget and script. I'm sure most of the actors tried their best in this, but knowing how their pedigree would turn out in later years for people like John Leguizamo, they must be somewhat embarrased in how their performances turned out. Yet, while I admit SMB is a ridiculous mess of a movie, it entertained me on the veritable "so-bad-it's-pretty-good" sort-of level. Gamers may want to stay far away, as the deviations from the source material may make them cry. Everyone else...avoid if you hate bad movies, I guess.

Not convinced? Maybe the cheesy, early-90s trailer will sway your opinion -

6/10

Peace,
- Jon