Time: 93 Minutes
Age Rating: PG – Violence
Cast:
Chris Pratt as Mario
Anya Taylor-Joy as Princess Peach
Charlie Day as Luigi
Jack Black as Bowser
Keegan-Michael Key as Toad
Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong
Fred Armisen as Cranky Kong
Director: Aaron Horvath, Michael Jelenic

I was sceptical about the upcoming animated Super Mario Bros. movie ever since its announcement. First of all, while video games have had some decent to great adaptations, Mario isn’t exactly prime movie/tv material compared to the likes of The Last of Us, Tomb Raider, or even League of Legends. Then there’s the fact that it would be made by Illumination, the studio behind the Despicable Me and Minions movies, which didn’t inspire confidence. Then there was a weirdly large and star-studded voice cast filled with well-known actors, including Charlie Day, Jack Black, Anya Taylor-Joy, Seth Rogen, and most controversially, Chris Pratt as Mario. Still, I decided to check out the movie, and it was actually just fine.

The plot is incredibly thin, simple and fast paced, and it spends little to no time getting us emotionally invested in the world, story or characters. Granted, it is a Mario movie and I’m not sure that you can give a movie this much depth with this source material. There’s plenty of gags here, generally they are hit or miss. Its a very safe modern day animated kids movie, inoffensive and not aspiring to do anything interesting. The writing on the whole is lacking, but it is fun and isn’t boring at least. There are plenty of references to the Mario games, and even as someone who’s only played some levels of Super Mario Bros. 3, I got most of them. Anyone who recognises the characters and how the game works will get it. However, if you aren’t familiar with Mario on any level whatsoever, you might find the movie hard to get into.

The voice cast is unnecessarily star studded, generally they are fine in their parts, but its unlikely that they would’ve been better than full time voice actors. If you were on the internet at the time, you were probably aware of heavy backlash at the announcement that Chris Pratt would be voicing Mario. I really wasn’t into that idea, but considering the approach that they had for Mario in this movie, I thought he did alright. Obviously they didn’t want to have Mario’s classic recognisable voice for the entirety of the movie, and while he’s not great by any means, I don’t really have any complaints with him. Anya Taylor-Joy was decent as Princess Peach, Charlie Day was great as Luigi, and Jack Black is the standout as Bowser. Funnily enough, the only one who was out of place was Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong, who just sounds like Seth Rogen (and even does the infamous Seth Rogen laugh at one point).

For what its worth, the animation looks pretty good. It’s bright, colourful, and nails the looks of the worlds and characters. The action sequences are entertaining to watch too.  Composer Brian Tyler was actually really good at incorporating classic Mario themes and sounds into the film’s score, definitely one of the movie’s stronger aspects. Despite the solid composed music, Illumination falls into one of its worst habits by using existing popular songs. I expected maybe a couple of famous songs, however it was far worse than I thought it would be. In fact, I think this is probably the worst ‘needle drop’ movie I have seen. Within the first 8 minutes alone, they play Battle Without Honor or Humanity, and No Sleep Till Brooklyn. It was actually astounding that they had so little restraint. Its not enough to kill the movie for me, but it was definitely the most annoying part of the film.

The Super Mario Bros. Movie is an above average, safe and very typical animated movie, with very thin plot and characters. However, it is mildly entertaining, with good visuals and a decent enough voice cast. Overall, it’s exactly the movie you were expecting when you heard of Illumination doing a Super Mario Bros. movie, except that Chris Pratt was actually fine as Mario. It isn’t that good, but if you are somewhat familiar with the games, you might get some entertainment out of it.