The Super Mario Bros.

4 outta 5

2023’s animated adaptation The Super Mario Bros. is a step up from the live-action 1993 attempt. That was… liberal with the source material, to put it mildly. This version, made by Illumination Animation that also put out all those Minions movies, is much closer to the source. It may be guilty of coasting on Easter Egg references, and the movie’s plot structure is like playing the Mario platform game, jumping from level to level and task to task while collecting power-ups. But it is a propulsive, ensemble chase film that is very funny and looks fantastic as the colourful world of Super Mario Bros. is recreated for a vibrant experience.

Mario (Chris Pratt) and Luigi (Charlie Day) are plumbers in New York that poured their money into a rapping commercial and are waiting for success. One day a trip down the sewer sends them spiraling through a magical portal into the Mushroom Kingdom with colourful creatures and talking turtles. The brothers are separated with Luigi captured by the evil King Koopa conqueror, Bowser (Jack Black). Mario finds the adventurous Toad (Keegan-Michael Key) who leads Mario to Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy). She needs help from the Kong kingdom to fight Bowser, and they’ll only assist by having Mario confront the gigantic Donkey Kong (Seth Rogen). All these (rainbow) roads lead to the final showdown where Bowser’s ultimate plan of domination, and his dream of marrying Peach, could spell doom for the realm.

There are some small subversions of the Mario game series tropes. Princess Peach in the games has been perpetually kidnapped, but this movie gives her agency. The film makes her such an ass-kicker it feels almost an apology for all the times Bowser snatched her away in the games. She is hyper-competent, like when she shows Mario an obstacle training course, she admits she was able to complete the course immediately. Luigi ends up being kidnap bait and not hanging with his brother much. These reversals of Mario tropes are, momentarily, flipped back by the end. Princess Peach is eventually taken hostage by Bowser, but when she breaks herself free it’s not because Mario saves her, instead she suddenly becomes Elsa from Frozen. Luigi does eventually team up with Mario and it’s one of the best scenes in the movie that uses one of the series most iconic items.

The film stays, somewhat dutifully, true to the gameplay source. In the movie, the obstacle course Peach trains Mario at looks like something out of the Mario platforming gameplay levels. And using power ups is exactly like the game. Punch a block, take the item, get a power-up burst, and lose the power when Mario gets hit. People who played the Mario games will get it, although some newcomers may wonder why characters are shooting fire or glowing with star power.

References to the game’s various levels, powers, and spin off games are plentiful in the Super Mario Bros. movie. There is a propulsive feel like playing a Mario game where the player must run through one obstacle course to the next. It is a thin plot as characters bounce from one area to another based upon Mario games, but it is true to the source. The easter eggs are grand as characters go across Rainbow Road on Karts from the Mario Kart series. During a chase, Mario jumps from one level of Rainbow Road to the next which was a glitch from Mario Kart 64. Like the Donkey Kong game, Mario has an antagonistic relationship with the big ape as Kong is always talking smack. With Seth Rogen providing the voice of Kong sounding just like Seth Rogen, it works because Rogen can be snarky.

Pratt is an unexpected choice for Mario, mostly because he doesn’t sound a dang thing like the iconic Mario voice everyone has known for decades. The Brothers make a commercial, set to the tune of the ‘80s cartoon and say they’re putting on accents for the advertising purposes. Watching the commercial with them is an enthusiastic guy voiced by the original Mario actor Charles Martinet, playing a game called Jumpman which was an early name for Mario. So, the film acknowledges the Brothers sound different, provides the sweet shot of fan service by having an original Mario cameo, then jumps back into things. The commercial is also hilarious with an awesomely confused shot of an actress reading her lines (which was used as art for this article).

Day and Key as Luigi and Toad and put in some nicely amusing loud pitched vocal deliveries. Luigi is imprisoned with a glowing star making nihilistic pronouncements about the inevitability of death which is darkly funny. Joy as Peach has amusing bombastic moments, like when she makes a big speech her subjects ask who Mario is and she says, loudly, “He’s nobody important!” and everyone cheers. As Bowser, Black is evil yet weirdly tender like when he performs a ballad about being in love with Peach, singing her name over and over. It’s silly and hilarious.

Super Mario Bros. will probably play much better to people who know the entire series as they count numerous references. But it also works as a visually lush, funny adventure movie. Like playing the game, the characters are buzzing from one world to the next and the fun is seeing how they make it through various obstacles along the way.