Review: The Super Mario Bros. Movie is a madcap love letter to fans

[Karlston]

Who needs a plot? This roller coaster of a movie made my inner 10-year-old jump for joy.

Me-ow.

Nintendo; Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures

 

I've been waiting three decades for Hollywood to make a film that could wash away my disappointing memories of seeing the 1993 Super Mario Bros. movie in theaters on opening weekend.

 

Yes, I know that famously messy production has now become something of a cult classic among people who are now nostalgic for its uniquely '90s vibe. But I'm still not completely recovered from my experience as a 10-year-old Mario superfan who was crushed to see a completely unrecognizable version of Mario on the silver screen. Rather than a loving homage to the world of my favorite video game, that younger version of me got an unrelated gonzo steampunk fever dream with the barest sprinkling of Mario references layered on top.

If anything, Illumination's The Super Mario Bros. Movie has the opposite problem. This film version captures all the fun and vibrancy of the Mario games, with enough references to familiar characters, items, and locations to make even a die-hard Mario fan's head spin. But the movie is so maniacally focused on squeezing in so many of those references at a madcap pace that the film comes off as unfocused, cluttered, and nearly incomprehensible from a story perspective.

 

It's also everything that a 10-year-old version of me could ever have dreamed of a Mario movie being.

Let's-a-go

The Mario games aren't exactly known for their deep plots, so it should be no surprise that this film's story is almost painfully straightforward. Mario and Luigi, two tight-knit but struggling Brooklyn plumbers, get separated when they unexpectedly fall into the fantastical Mushroom Kingdom. Instead of the usual Mario-saves-the-princess tale, Mario seeks Princess Peach's help to rescue his brother from Bowser's evil clutches. Peach—cast here as an endearing badass girl boss eager to protect her mushroom subjects—leads a fish-out-of-water Mario on a quest to recruit allies and stop Bowser for good.

 

I won't spoil the ending, but was it really in doubt? Mario's platform games tend to end only one way, after all...

 

No clogs in this pipe.

Nintendo; Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures

An okey-dokey voice

After Chris Pratt's distracting debut voicing Mario in a trailer last year, I was surprised to find I didn't much notice or mind his performance in the final movie. That's largely because Mario ends up with a relatively minor speaking role in his own movie, pushed aside for other more take-charge characters. It's also in part because, even when Mario does speak, he doesn't say much that's memorable.

 

The filmmakers have some fun with the idea of a more stereotypical Italian accent for Mario at points early on. Without spoiling the specifics, I'd urge game fans to keep an ear out for a prominent cameo appearance from Charles Martinet's familiar tones.

 

There are a few perfunctory attempts at deeper characterization as the plot meanders from point to point. Mario gets an annoying family of Italian stereotypes, for instance, just so the film can spend roughly 30 seconds examining his drive to impress a withholding father. Bowser, meanwhile, is driven by dual desires to destroy the Mushroom Kingdom and force Peach to wed him under duress, a dichotomy that the film is at least self-aware enough to poke fun at.

 

These and other tropey subplots—the "enemies become friends" one; the "family is stronger together" one; the "meet-cute romantic interest" one—are not given nearly enough time to breathe, even by the standard of similar family films. If you were hoping for some Paper Mario-style lore—or even a focused, character-heavy, Super Mario Adventures-style quest—you'll end up disappointed.

Wahoo!

I swear this is a scene from a dream I had as a child.

Nintendo; Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures

Why spend time on plot or character development, though? In The Super Mario Bros. Movie, those are mere distractions in the rush to get to the next game-reference-filled tent-pole spectacle.

 

It feels at points like the filmmakers are checking off a list of familiar Mario moments as fast as possible: 'OK, so here's the Mushroom Kingdom, let's do a quick panning shot to show what life is like for these strange Mushroom people. Oh, no time for any more of that, here's Princess Peach's castle. Now let's squeeze in a quick introduction for Donkey Kong. OK, that's done, now let's get everyone driving karts on Rainbow Road for barely justified plot reasons because everyone loves Mario Kart, right? And can we get another fan-favorite power-up in this scene, maybe?'

Not saving much for the Super Mario Kart movie...

Nintendo; Illumination Entertainment & Universal Pictures

Through it all, the filmmakers seem a little too pleased with themselves whenever another one of Mario's well-established proper nouns appears on screen for the first time. The movie is absolutely filled with long, lingering shots introducing some fan-favorite character, item, or location—complete with on-the-nose musical cues—on top of even more blink-and-you'll-miss-it background gags. It all seems tailor-made to activate the nostalgic Captain America "I understood that reference" meme center of players' brains, while leaving parents unfamiliar with the games scratching their heads.

 

Here's the thing: I can't fault the movie for this madcap, reference-heavy, plot-light pace. That's because the film is at its best when the characters shut their mouths and focus on simply imitating their video game versions. So it's not exactly a bad thing that the movie is packed to the gills with lengthy action set pieces, from a delightful training montage to a frenetic ice flower battle to one scene that evokes Super Smash Bros.

 

It helps that all of these set pieces are an absolute visual feast. The movie looks like one of those cheap "What if Mario was made in the Unreal Engine?" YouTube videos, only with the time, budget, and talent of some of Hollywood's best animators. There's a subtle "hyper-reality" sheen on top of every familiar character and location design, which works well due to the kind of swooping camera angles and exaggerated animations that you can get away with in a film but which don't really work in the interactive parts of most games.

 

 

Emerging from this almost nonstop sequence of high-octane, glitzy reimaginings of cherished Mario game moments, I was reminded of my recent visit to the Super Nintendo World theme park. The Super Mario Bros. Movie is like a roller-coaster version of the games. There's a lot of motion, a lot of familiar scenery, and then before you know it, you're emerging back into the real world a little breathless and a little hazy on the specifics of what just happened.

 

In short, it's the Mario movie that my inner 10-year-old has been craving for decades.

 

 

Review: The Super Mario Bros. Movie is a madcap love letter to fans