The Super Mario Bros. Movie

The world’s most famous video game character is back on the big screen. For my birthday on April 6, 2023, I watched The Super Mario Bros. Movie, based on the Mario franchise of video games. Starring Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy, and Charlie Day, it is directed by Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic. The movie takes place in Brooklyn and the Mushroom Kingdom and is rated PG.

Two Italian-American brothers named Mario and Luigi are struggling to make their Brooklyn-based plumbing business a success. One day, through a series of events, they find themselves in a strange world called the Mushroom Kingdom. They get separated and Luigi is captured by the evil King Bowser. Mario joins forces with Princess Peach and a resident mushroom, Toad, to rescue Luigi and stop Bowser’s plans of conquering the kingdom. Can Mario stop Bowser and rescue Luigi while proving himself a hero?

As a diehard fan of the Mario video games since I was a child, I was very worried about this movie at first. After two film adaptations that just were not that good (which you can read my review of here and here), it did not leave much hope for this movie to be any good. It was also made by Illumination Entertainment, who are a good animation studio, but seemed like an odd choice considering they are known for the Despicable Me movies. My biggest worry came when I saw the voice cast they hired, as it looked more like a joke cast than a real one, being full of comedians. However, when the trailers came out, I got more excited. When I finally saw the movie, it did not disappoint. Let me explain why.

The first strength of the movie is in how well it captures the feel of the games. The Mushroom Kingdom is filled with tons of homages. From the blocks that give power-ups to the different locations that represent different worlds, fans get to see their favorite childhood symbol come to life. They even went the extra mile by including Donkey Kong characters. A stark contrast to the 1993 film, which represented nothing fans would want to see. I also want to say that while I normally am not that fond of animated films being computer animated now, as I prefer hand-drawn animation, it works here because it looks like the graphics from the games nowadays.

The movie’s voice cast shines allowing for the strengths of each character to be shown. I mentioned that I was initially turned off by the casting choices when I first heard of them, but I have to say, they really impressed me. Let us start with Chris Pratt as Mario. While a lot of people were bugged by the decision to not have him speak with Mario’s famous stereotypical Italian accent, I think it is for the best that he did not do that. It works for a video game, but hearing nothing but that for an entire movie would have driven me insane. Pratt works because he shows off a more vulnerable Mario. He is not used to the surroundings of the Mushroom Kingdom, so he messes up at times, but he is trying to do his best for the sake of his brother. There is also a nice storyline with him wanting to prove himself as capable, as he is constantly mocked and insulted by people who think he is a failure in life. Anya Taylor-Joy does a rather nice job as Princess Peach. This version of her is changed from a damsel in distress to joining in on the action. I like this change more, as it makes her more interesting than the game character, who was bland and generic. She nevertheless keeps the character’s kindness and charm, so I think it balances out nicely. The last voice actor I want to talk about is Jack Black as Bowser. Out of all the actors, he is the one I was the most unsure of. It sounded like such an odd choice. It ended up being a good choice. He manages to make Bowser an intimidating villain, maybe even more so than his gaming counterpart, but still slips in some good comedic moments. His attraction to Peach is portrayed in a silly way, up to him singing a ridiculous song about it. That is the last voice actor I will go into depth about, but I still took note of Charlie Day as Luigi, Keegan Michael-Key as Toad, and Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong. Even Mario’s gaming voice actor Charles Martinet gets to voice a few characters. There is really something here for everyone.

Finally, what made this movie work was the writers’ ability to craft an interesting story. As much as I love the Mario games, they have little to no plot in them. I was really wondering how they would be able to entertain me in plot form. For one thing, I give credit to Illumination for taking this story seriously and not making it like their other movies. There is silliness sure, but they never make the plot too silly. Mario and Luigi’s brotherly bond is established early in the movie and is so nice to watch that it makes you root for Mario rescuing Luigi even more. Plus, the decision to give Mario an arc about proving himself as capable really added to that story, given he has no real motivation in the games beyond act heroic. I also like that they explained certain things that the games never did, filling us in on those gaps Nintendo opened. If I was to make one complaint about the movie, I thought they chose a lame location to have the final battle take place in, even if it is a cool fight. Besides that, they did a surprisingly remarkable job with the story.

Overall, this movie managed to impress me. I will not say I liked it more than the Sonic the Hedgehog movies, but it is close. It is an amazing adaptation that ranks up there as one of the best video game adaptations ever. Make sure you see it while it is still in theaters, and stay until the end for 2 post-credits scenes.