There was no way that a good movie could be made from the Street Fighter franchise. The very concept of a Street Fighter movie stands in antithesis of the games. How does one make a film from a concept that features nothing more than two people with irrelevant motives punching each other into unconsciousness in a no-hold-barred fighting competition? The canvas is bare, obviously, and you can fill those gaps with any manner of things, but why? And won't the details that surround the concept ultimately corrupt and overpower the idea of people duking it out in some street competition for some ultimate prize?

That aside, Street Fighter: The Legend Of Chun-Li takes the different approach of ostensibly attempting to focus on a single character's plot line instead of trying to turn the entire game into a single movie. Unfortunately, Street Fighter still doesn't have the script to pull off the feat.

First off, some might be put off by the choice of "Smallville" actress Kristin Kreuk as Chun-Li. And while she comes across as very young, much younger than she is, she actually does a surprisingly good job, particularly in the fight scenes, where I would have assumed she would be totally out of her league. Instead, she shows a great ability to act through the fight choreography and bring intense emotion to her fight scenes.

The rest of the cast is a mixed bag, all good actors, but, just like Kreuk to a lesser degree, all of their performances are dragged down by the terrible script. Before I attempt to point out any of the acting flaws, it'd probably be helpful to run down the plot so you understand the mess these actors have gotten into.

We meet Chun-Li in Hong Kong as a child, an aspiring piano virtuoso whose Asian father is some sort of rich business type, the importance of whom we never have adequately explained during the course of the film. Along comes veteran character actor Neal McDonough as Bison, who, along with his henchman Balrog (played by Michael Clarke Duncan), kidnaps Chun-Li's father under the threat of murdering his family if he doesn't cooperate. A decade passes and Chun-Li the piano student is nudged along by the receipt of a mysterious, ancient scroll and cancer-related death of her Caucasian mother to search out a path in the world. The scroll supposedly relates to some thug turned good-guy martial artist named Gen, who resides in Bangkok. So Chun-Li heads off to Thailand on her own, living on the streets, for no conceivably good reason other than that she thinks Gen has already been watching her.

Meanwhile we're embroiled in the subplots of Bison, who has taken over all the various ethnic crime families that supposedly run Bangkok or elsewhere by having Vega murder them all then consolidating their power into his Shadaloo business organization, and the cops, Bangkok organized crime police detective Maya Sunee (played by Moon Bloodgood) and Interpol agent Charlie Nash (played by Chris Klein), investigating Bison and Shadaloo.

The police subplot is more or less a waste of everyone's time, but it works as filler in Chun-Li's bland and predictable hero quest. Moon Bloodgood is more or less wasted as Sunee, not to mention that there's nothing vaguely Thai about her, and Chris Klein, though enjoyable in Just Friends, chews the scenery with reckless abandon and more or less delivers the worst performance in Street Fighter.

Back on the streets of Bangkok, Chun-Li is still wading through the bullshit of the "when Gen wants to be found, he'll find you" school of plot resolution and is mainly spending her time trying to find food and shelter and stay alive. Finally, she stands up to defend a downtrodden person, as is foreshadowed twice earlier in the film, and, as expected, that's when Gen finally takes her in and explains to her that Bison has her father, he used to work with Bison until he grew a conscience, and that he'll help her save her father as soon as she's worked out her issues and has gotten the appropriate level of Karate Kid-type training, including shooting fireballs from her hands.

From here on out, it becomes a series of moronic set-pieces that involve martial arts fights between Gen, Chun-Li and random baddies and gunfights between Sunee and Nash and random baddies. The criminals are being all criminal-y in anticipation of some sort of special shipment and our heroes are damned determined to stop that shipment, catch Bison red-handed, or just get Chun-Li's father back. Which she doesn't manage to do in the course of the movie, anyway, I guess giving her the motivation to continue her Street Fighter-like ways after the thing is over.

Now, to spoil a movie that can't really be spoiled, this is where we find out that Bison is the child of Irish missionaries, an orphan growing up on the Bangkok streets, who eventually sacrifices his pregnant bride in a magic cave for dark power and to put his conscience and good side into his baby, which he rips from the mother's stomach. Yes, it's as stupid as it sounds. So, by giving up his wife, he gets to kick ass at martial arts and, most importantly, put his conscience into his daughter... who then turns out to be the cargo being snuck from Russia into Bangkok that everyone's so hot to catch him with. Confused? Wondering how any of that makes sense? Don't bother thinking about it.

So, it all comes down to a big fight at Bison's house between Gen, Chun-Li, and Nash and all those Shadaloo assholes. And Chun-Li snaps Bison's neck and his daughter gets "rescued" after being totally non-plussed to watch her deadbeat murderer dad get killed in front of her by strangers.

So, the acting... McDonough, an American, is tasked with doing the usual overacting "bad guy" role, all while trying out a tragic Irish accent. His parents were Irish. But then you have to ask: if he's a fucking orphan, raised on the streets in Thailand, why does he have an Irish accent? And why isn't he Russian? Wasn't Bison an uber-Soviet-type character in the game?

Michael Clarke Duncan is wasted as Balrog, but at least physically convincing. Taboo of the Black Eyed Peas is in there for no reason as Vega, seemingly appearing just to have Vega in the movie. And why all the villains anyway? Why kill off the whole bad guy section of the Street Fighter retinue if they wanted to make more movies and even made reference to the next film, involving Gen going to Japan to recruit Ryu, at the movie's end?

The script woes, inconsistencies, and casting issues aside, the movie has a look and tone that reminds me of Ballistic: Echs vs. Sever, a movie I actually enjoyed much more than Street Fighter. It probably says a lot that they spent $50 million on such a mediocre film and it says even more that they only made $10 million back. It's substantially lame and amateurish while looking generically decent, like every other $30+ million on the planet. It's an embarrassment to everyone who made it for its sheer lack of ambition and noteworthy qualities.

Despite some awkward moments, Kreuk actually comes out none the worse for wear and I have more respect for her than I ever did before. I wouldn't mind seeing her in something very non-Street-Fighter-related. Moon Bloodgood also walks away clean, because, well, I'd forgive her of infanticide with a side order of ethnic cleansing, and she's barely in the movie to begin with. The only thing I'll probably take away from the film, in the end, is how damned good Moon Bloodgood looks.

Ultimately, almost anyone could have written a better movie, though I'm not sure Street Fighter, as a concept, deserves any better than this. Hopefully we can put the whole thing to bed and pretend it never happened, the Street Fighter concept along with it.

IMDb

HBO's "Hung" is the latest in their attempts to recapture the glory of past years' pay cable ratings bonanzas.

Initially, exclusive programming on pay cable networks was an enticement to subscribers aside from the same old reruns of movies shown a thousand times. Later on, the made-for-pay-cable series was a jewel in the network's crown, award bait, and people lined up to catch the episodes as soon as they aired. HBO had been the leader in this area for most of pay cable history, churning out early series like "Not Necessarily The News", "1st & Ten", and, more recently, powerhouses like "The Sopranos", "Six Feet Under", and "Sex And The City". Aside from the actual quality or merit of these particular shows, they paved the way for the concept of non-network programming, edgy television, and award-winning television.

HBO has hit on harder times. The days of "The Soparanos" are gone. All their once-powerful, award-winning shows have ended. Showtime, after many false, sputtering starts has not only managed to develop a comparable level of programming but have totally surpassed HBO with a wave of fan favorites like "Dead Like Me", "Dexter", "Weeds", "The L Word" and a variety of new material that seems to make HBO's programming feel like a cheap, shallow imitation in comparison.

In many ways, it is this particular situation that works to the detriment of a show like "Hung", as the avid viewer's first reaction is that the new series has the feel of a darker, less-humorous, hour-long "Californication". This comparison might be apt in some capacity, but is a bit unfair to Thomas Jane's fledgling series, paired up with the overtly-sexual "True Blood".

Though some comparisons could be made between the elements and tones of the two shows, there are a variety of differences between "Californication" and "Hung" that could prove to be interesting in the future. Where David Duchovny portrayed a man giving in endlessly to his vices when he should know better, leading the audience to frustration that the character they are expected to relate to is too god-damned stupid to just move on to where we all know he's going. While it did prove amusing to some extent and offered humorous situations for Hank Moody to flounder in, "Californication" fell into a trap of providing the audience with a smart, likable lead that should know better and is regressing out of personal flaws and obstinance. His only conflict was internal: a man against his own subconscious desire to ruin his life through immature acts.

"Hung" at least provides a more compelling starting point for our ostensible hero. Ray Drecker, played by the afore-mentioned Thomas Jane, is a single dad to a set of twins, divorced, a teacher and a coach. After being left by his former beauty queen wife, Ray moves back into his childhood home with his twins and continues his bland life as father, history teacher, and coach until a house fire leaves him alone, camping in his back yard, trying to scrounge enough to rebuild his ruined home. Realizing that he's a nobody, a complete loser who's never accomplished anything, he desperately looks for a get-rich quick scheme to return his life to normal and provide a home for his ever-more-distant children. The particular get-rich-quick scheme that Ray is led to is whoring himself out as a gigolo.

Now, on one hand you have a promising talent that wastes his gifts and acts like a retarded child, on the other you have a nobody that is trying to make anything of his life to better his family situation and give some meaning to a wasted existence. The latter is, ultimately, a deeper and more sustainable story, but whether it will come to fruition at all remains to be seen. The first episode was interesting and amusing in a slightly perverse way, but gives little indication as to where the season will lead.

One of the more interesting points is the total avoidance of attractive characters. Typically, any TV show will feature inordinately attractive individuals in as many main roles as possible, as it's TV... Hot people are nice to look at. But this show actively avoids the beautiful people. Ray's twins are chunky nerds, his former prom queen ex-wife is average-looking, and most other people in the cast are anywhere between weathered and somewhat ugly. The show does take place in Detroit, but everyone is surprisingly plain, which could also prove to be an interesting element of the show.

In the coming weeks, "Hung" will either prove to be an interesting addition to HBO's line-up or will be another weak attempt to match Showtime's lead.

Perhaps I'm getting too used to the stylings of Mr. Boll. Maybe he's growing on me. Maybe I'm tired and don't know what I'm saying. But, after Bloodrayne II actually had a bit of style to it and Dungeon Siege was enjoyable in a simple fantasy way, I think Boll is setting a trend of making watchable, if not good, movies. Postal is another example of this.

Perhaps it's going to be easier in general for Uwe (I think we're close enough now that I can call him by his first name) to make comedies. Some people think his drama and horror is laughable as it is. Though I know that comedy is hard, harder than drama any day. But, having started his career with comedy, perhaps it's more of an area of ease for Uwe Boll. Not that it's a brilliant comedy, by any standard. No, it's a tolerable, somewhat amusing film, but it's not going to become a cult classic anytime soon.

For a movie that billed itself so heavily on its tastelessness, it's not a terribly offensive movie and the story has a wink of wit to it. The comedy also has a few gems in there, but, as you could likely guess, much of it isn't all that funny. Though, for the most part, I can say that it's easily watchable without ever feeling boring, tedious, or like a waste of time, something I think a viewer of Uwe's previous films might appreciate.

Zack Ward heads up the film and does a decent enough job with what's he's given. One has to appreciate the subtlety of his put-upon performance in a movie that, otherwise, is fairly over-the-top with everything else. He does build nicely onto his frustration, as he's caught in schemes with cultists and Muslim jihadists, all plotitng to destroy the world.

Realistically, it was a smart way to mine the content of the game, as there's no plot there, just violence and mayhem, which this movie accomplishes with cartoonish abandon without turning the lead into an unstable psychopath.

The other actors also help to carry the weight. Dave Foley provides a strong comedic background for the film, as well as full frontal nudity. Chris Coppola upholds the family name (even though he's not related) with wild overacting as Foley's right-hand man, but is fun. Jackie Tohn is somewhat buried in the film as the ostensible female lead, but I liked her right out of the gate. Aside from being super-cute, she has a good style about her and I just wish the movie hadn't wasted her as much as it did, as you like her. Or at least I do, but perhaps that's just a side-effect of my daydream-like wishes of being young (again) and hot (for the first time) and scooping up some smart and sassy lady like this.

There are appearances by Ralf Moeller, Verne Troyer, J.K. Simmons, and a variety of others that'll make you say "Oh... What are they doing in this movie?" All of them do a good job of adding some laughs, particularly Troyer, but the real show-stealer is Boll himself, appearing as... well, himself. He's the owner of a German-themed amusement park that plays on just about every German stereotype, extending all the way into Nazism. Boll admits that his films are financed with Nazi gold and that he's turned on by children. Bascially everything that people have been accusing him of all these years. But, despite however much of a dick Uwe is, it shows he's a good sport and can take his punches too, even if it requires him to beat on his critics to do it.

The film looks and feels low-budget and the quality isn't quite that of most of his other films, but it gives it a certain genuine nature that makes the whole thing feel a little more natural. If this mess of crazy surreal shit looked like a $40 million movie, then it'd probably be a low day for the movie industry. But the fact that the whole thing looks and feels like a big goof makes it all more palitable. At least for this one, we're in on the joke.

IMDb