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Hello Cinephiles,
Today we’re talking about the 2023 film The Super Mario Bros. Movie.
Story
The writing was concise and clean. The story was a thin scaffolding for large game set pieces and had little to no substance. I appreciated all the nods to the vast catalogue of Mario games.
Score: 0.5
Characters
Mario and Luigi were fairly bland. The addition of their family felt weird and the fake, and disappearing, accents were jarring. I had my reservations about Donkey Kong being played by Seth Rogen but his iconic laugh was perfect for Kong.
I already knew that Bowser would steal the show and he did. Jack Black did an excellent job. A great surprise was the nihilistic cheerful blue star Lumalee. Absolutely hilarious.
Score: 0.5
Dialogue
The video game references were great and everything Lumalee said were great. Bowser’s dialogue was good, but the rest was a little forced and juvenile.
This is not a movie that will be quoted outside of Bowser’s lines.
Score: 0.5
Visuals and Music
Visually stunning and impressively colourful. It was great to watch the background and see all the easter eggs.
The original song will be stuck in my head forever and the rest of the score was wonderfully referential.
Score: 1
Fun
This was an easy watch with lots of nostalgia. I’ve been playing mario games since the eighties and this was very faithful to the world.
That being said, I really did find Mario and Luigi to be the weakest part of the movie.
Score: 1
Overall
A fairly inoffensive nostalgia-driven ride that will have gamers pausing every five seconds for the easter eggs, others will enjoy the angst free fair, and kids will be singing “Peaches” for way too long.
Final Score: 3.5 Stars out of 5