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SYNOPSIS:
Shadaloo, South - East Asia 1995. As civil war enters its seventh month, warlord General M Bison brings the crisis to the brink of global conflict when he takes 63 Allied Nations relief workers hostage, threatening to execute them unless a ransom of $20 billion is forthcoming. Colonel William F Guile is given the mission to rescue the hostages but first he must locate them. So Guile and British Intelligence Officer, Cammy recruit two unlikely heroes in an audacious plan to track down the sadistic General's futuristic fortress. But their entire plan is nearly derailed at the last moment when GNT news correspondent Chun-Li Zang intervenes and she wants much more than a story...
The action reaches fever pitch as Guile, Bison and their collective
forces clash in a highly-charged climatic battle with the
fate of the free world hanging in the balance.
MOVIE
REVIEW:
I
remember "Street Fighter" was the last movie I caught
at Orchard cinema before it was tear down to make way for
the present Orchard cineleisure complex. So many years have
passed and yet it doesn’t change my opinion of how bad
SF was.
"Street
Fighter" the movie was in fact approved, licensed and
funded by the maker of the original hugely popular arcade
game from the '80s, Capcom. Yet it was unintentionally bad,
anything from the plot downright to the acting and editing.
Director/Writer
Steven De Souza who wrote a couple of blockbusters such as
"Die Hard", "48 Hours" prior to it has
no idea when it comes to helming this video game adaptation.
He wanted it to be as realistic as possible thus the whole
plot took almost three quarters of the running time just to
get things going and setting up the various characters (sadly
with no impression of any of them in the end). I guess back
then he’s trying to pull off what Christopher Nolan
did to Batman. But Christian Bale was too young to play the
lead so Souza has to settle for Jean Claude Van Damme for
his role as Colonel Guile. The usually wooden Van Damme, a
miscast Ming-Na Wen as Chun-Li (where’s Michelle Yeoh
when you need her?) and the late Raul Julia who hams it up
as the evil General Bison round up the downfall of this adaptation.
With the
exception of the costumes which have certain resemblance to
the arcade’s counterparts, the movie reeks nothing like
the game. Set in a fictional country called Shadaloo, Colonel
Guile is sent to stop the evil Bison who has taken innocent
hostages in his high-tech military fortress and demand a ransom
of $20 Billion. You know Bison is so bad because he also used
one of his hostages in a genetic experiment which turned him
into a green monster not Hulk but Blanka. And along the way
as if to oblige Capcom’s ego, Guile teams up with various
characters such as Chun-Li, Ken, Ryu and Honda (from the game
of course) to penetrate Bison’s lair.
The
biggest pulling factor of SF the game is the powers and kick-ass
moves of the characters. But under the hands of De Souza,
the action seems choreographed by your friendly neighborhood’s
taekwondo instructor instead. If Guile’s trademark 'back-flip
kick' looks like a little boy’s gymnastic move, you
are in whole lot of trouble. I don’t even one to delve
into Ken’s half-assed spinning kick and Ryu’s
pathetic 'hodoken'.
Asian
audience will fondly recall HK director Wong Jing’s
unauthorized usage of the SF property in a movie called "Future
Cops" which took the liberty of using the traits of the
infamous arcade characters. But it was ironically a closer
adaptation of the Capcom’s video game with its insane
action stunts. Jing even used it again in Jackie Chan’s
"City Hunter" where Chan did an awesome, hilarious
spoof of Chun-Li and E. Honda.
"Street
Fighter" is an exceptionally bad movie. The humor falls
flat with its load of cheesy, hooky dialogues and the actors’
performance either seem amateurish or over the top. If the
action sequences are respectfully done at least it will make
things easier for fans to swallow. This however should be
K.O. in pre-production stage.
SPECIAL FEATURES :
Behind the Scenes Featurette – This 6 minutes
feature covers the usual cast and crew interview. Van Damme
claims "Street Fighter" is similar to shooting the
James Bond movies or The Deer Hunter. Obviously either he
is on the wrong set or we are watching a completely different
movie.
Director's
Commentary – Steven De Souza sounds like a
pretty serious person. Here he is talking rather dryly about
working on the different aspects of the movie and his views
on the violence of videogames.
The
DVD also comes with 2 Street Fighter Anime Trailer
(which looks better than the live-action) and 2 Deleted
Scenes in its gritty original form.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
Presented
in 2.40:1 Widescreen, consider the 'age' of the movie, the
visual transfer looks neat and clean without any visible artifacts.
The Dolby Digital 5.1 reproduced the sound effects well enough
in the movie’s minimal engaging action sequences. Dialogue
remains clear throughout.
MOVIE RATING:
DVD
RATING :
Review
by Linus Tee
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