Mortal Kombat – Brutal Fights
Director: Simon McQuoid
Writer: Greg Russo, Dave Callaham (Screenplay) Oren Uziel, Greg Russo (Story)
Starring: Lewis Tan, Jessica McNamee, Josh Lawson, Joe Taslim, Mehcad Brooks, Matilda Kimber, Laura Brent, Hiroyuki Sanada
Plot: MMA fighter Cole Young seeks out Earth’s greatest champions in order to stand against the enemies of Outworld in a high stakes battle for the universe.
Tagline – Get over here.
Runtime: 1 Hour 50 Minutes
There may be spoilers in the rest of the review
Story: Mortal Kombat starts as Outworld assassin Bi-Han (Taslim) is sent to eliminate the Earth threats in the fight between the universes, a chance to make sure they always win, leaving one error, a baby. Cole (Tan) a descendant of that warrior grew up to become a great MMA fighter that is starting to lose his edge.
With the latest Mortal Kombat event coming up Shang Tsung (Han) isn’t willing to let Earth win, returning to his dirty tricks, sending Bi-Han, now going by Sub-Zero to Earth to eliminate the next round of contenders, including Cole, who is now getting advice from Sonya Blade (McNamee) on how to prepare for this battle.
Thoughts on Mortal Kombat
Characters & Performances – Cole Young is a descendant of a great warrior who has grown to become a great MMA fighter himself, only to find his own family being targeted by the Outworld assassins. He must learn quick about the world he has been placed, learning about his father and the world where Mortal Kombat will mean he will need to fight for everyone on Earth. Lewis Tan does well with the fighting side of the film, but does struggle with the calmer side of the film. Sonya Blade is the connection Cole makes to learn the deeper side of the Mortal Kombat, while she doesn’t have the marking, she sides with the Earth warriors proving her place in the squad. Bi-Han is one of the assassins that has been used to eliminate the human warriors for centuries. He has the powers of ice which he will use to attack his enemies. Shang Tsung has been defeating the Earth realm for centuries and now he wants to finish the battles giving him power over the Earth realm now matter how many dirty tackles come his way. We do meet plenty of different fighters from the video game series, each will get their moment in combat. Each of the performances are stronger with the building to the fighting being the main attraction.
Story – The story here follows a fighter than learns about the bigger battle between realms, with Earth being targeted by the Outworld, a place where the fighters will always look to cheat for an advantage, as he looks to help earth win to maintain their freedom. This is the stretch of the video game story, which will get a few complaints about certain characters going missing. The story is told in a way that we learn much like Cole as the world in unfolding on front of us, with the development of the human fighters coming as the threat becomes clearer. The story doesn’t feel like we get too much more though, leaving the slow build at the start to fill in and world building, over character development.
Themes – Mortal Kombat is an action film that brings to life the video game franchise, as someone who never played the games, I can’t tell you how many of the popular characters are included or are not, but when it comes to the pure fighting, we get the highlight of the film, with the flat-out brutal fights we get to see. Each location is used to add to the fights, with each one easily being somewhere you could see in the background of any fighting game.
Mortal Kombat is a brutal action film that doesn’t hold back on the violence in the fights, even if the story isn’t that deep.