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‘Mortal Kombat’ Movie Review: A Fine Mix of Action and Gore

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

Ritika Kispotta - Fri, 23 Apr 2021 18:46:57 +0100 2676 Views
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Video-game adaptations are exhausting to pull off, however, the task becomes considerably tougher once the source material is an arcade fighting game with the plot and characters there as an excuse to make people fight. After a 1995 adaptation that delivered warm results and its terrible follow-up that destroyed the franchise, 2021’s Mortal Kombat can make the fans of the long-running video game series happy since it seems the most effective way to adapt a Mortal Kombat game which is to treat it like a Mortal Kombat game. Concerning plot and character development largely as an afterthought and exceed at the only factor gamers love about the series - gruesome, creative fatalities.


Mortal Kombat is set as an adequate reboot of the story: A group of martial artists and mercenaries from Earth should find out how to defeat the powerful, magic forces of Outworld. While the setup follows the typical route of "Outworld has won nine tournaments in a row and should not be allowed to win the tenth," there are various twists added into the formula to make this movie feel unique from the earlier installments.


Mortal Kombat tries several different ways to make this fighting-game material into a compelling narrative, however, none of that works since all of them bump against one another. The main motive is to build a film around an original character named Cole Young (Lewis Tan), a descendant of Sub-Zero's ancient enemy Hanzo Hasashi (Hiroyuki Sanada). Cole is meant as a viewpoint character through whom the audience will be introduced to the planet of Mortal Kombat, however, the time spent halfheartedly developing his family life and backstory as an MMA fighter means that there is less plot space to develop for opposite characters, all of whom are more recognizable and more visually attention-grabbing.


Another constructive technique here is that the conception of a cosmic tournament in which Earth's best fighters should fight to guard their dimension from invasion. The tournament’s conception is a technique to justify having a bunch of characters that fight each other in close combat, except the tournament never really happens because the fighters get restless beforehand and begin picking fights with one another anyway! Why most of the screen time was wasted talking about a tournament if it wasn’t supposed to happen is still unclear.


Mortal Kombat has taken most of its biggest lessons from the trendy superhero blockbuster whereas avoiding a number of their worst action pitfalls. No faceless, shadowy mobs of antagonists. Where a group of weird villains was sacrificed in a way that does not impact the initial strategy. Because of tactile and intimate one-on-one fighting, its blockbuster filmmaking manages to be a pleasant action film. It may not fix video game movies overnight, however, Mortal Kombat may finally deliver their sweepingly bad name a devastating fatality. And it does have moments that are top-which will give anyone who’s spent time with the arcade fighter chills.


Final Score – [7.2/10]
Reviewed by – Ritika Kispotta
Follow her @KispottaRitika on Twitter (https://twitter.com/KispottaRitika)

 

 

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