THE GEEKLY RETRO REVIEW - 'Street Fighter' (1994)

Back in the 1990s, Hollywood had an idea to take video game properties, observe only the bare bones of what those games were about, and make something in live action that no one really wanted. In 1993, "Super Mario Bros: The Movie" came out barely resembling the brightly colored games they were based on and it was completely panned by critics. It was the start of a curse where video game adaptations usually didn't turn out good aside from a few notable exceptions.

A year after "Super Mario Bros.", two video game adaptations came out. The first one, "Double Dragon", was somehow worse than "Super Mario Bros." and was quickly forgotten. The second film in 1994 was "Street Fighter", a film very loosely based on "Street Fighter II", a fighting game that was not only popular but was also the first fighting game that brought the genre into the mainstream for gamers.

The story for the movie seems to suggest that writer and director Steven E. de Souza (of "Die Hard" fame) had only played the game a few times, saw the basic story, and just ran with it in a completely different direction. In the movie, Jean-Claude Van Damme plays Guile, a special forces operative that is trying to take down General M. Bison, a madman bent on taking over the world through the control of the fictional nation, Shadaloo. Guild must enlist the aide of a group of allies to complete his mission of taking down M. Bison once and for all.

Now, to be clear off the bat, "Street Fighter" is not a good film. It's bad and there is no getting around that. However, unlike both "Double Dragon" and "Super Mario Bros.", there is a weird sort of charm to the movie. While it may be bad, it is immensely watchable for reasons I can't fully explain. Perhaps, it falls under that infamous category, "It's so bad, it's good."

The movie could also be helped by Raul Julia as Bison. This would, sadly, by Julia's final performance but he seems to relish the role of Bison. In this absurd film, Julia knows that the movie is campy and runs with it, playing Bison with a sense of the sinister but also with a dark sense of humor.

The rest of the cast also isn't that bad. Van Damme, an action star at the height of his powers at the time, also seems to be having fun with the material. In addition to him, Ming-Na Wen, an actress that would later go on to gain wide span fan admiration for her role in "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.", does a pretty good job as Chun-Li, a character that is seeking revenge against M. Bison.

Beyond the decent performances, though, you can tell that this movie was made on a budget. Hollywood may have wanted to adapt video games at the time, but they definitely didn't want to put much money on that bet. The sets look cheap, certain actors (*cough* Kylie Minogue *cough*) are horribly miscast, and for a film called "Street Fighter", there's not much street fighting goin on.

The fact is that the film's campy nature along with various other flaws will mean that the movie is not for everyone. Yet, if there are fans of cheesy B movies that are only below average adaptations of their video game source material, then this movie may provide the campy, over-the-top fun that you've been looking for.

2 1/2 Stars