‘The Super Mario Bros. Movie’ A Nostalgia Feast
Kids are likely to love The Super Mario Bros. Movie but adults craving cleverness over easter eggs and nostalgia might be a bit let down.
When The Super Mario Bros. Movie was announced, the internet exploded with opinions and questions ranging from “Why do we need this movie?” to “Why would they cast Chris Pratt as Mario?” Since then, Twitter has been awash with the typical hot takes, fan infighting, and threaded tweet essays about this movie.
I think maybe everyone needs to chill out a little bit.
It’s important to remember that The Super Mario Bros. Movie is first and foremost a movie for kids. Sure, adults are going to go see it, most of them with their kids, but the target demographic falls solidly into the kid category.
Kids don’t care about Pratt’s politics or whether something is a rehash of a movie from a couple decades before they were born. They aren’t usually that interested in things like plot and character. They like movies purely for the fun.
In that respect, Mario delivers with a runtime of just over 90 minutes, bright, colorful animation, a solid cast, and a zillion references to Mario games throughout the ages. Younger kids, in particular, will probably have a great time with this movie. Likewise, adults looking for turn-your-brain-off entertainment and the warm embrace of nostalgia will probably have fun with it.
The story sees Mario (Pratt) and his brother Luigi (Charlie Day) as plumbers in Brooklyn who get transported into the magical realm of the Mushroom Kingdom where they have to team up with Princess Peach (Anya Taylor-Joy) and Toad (Keegan-Michael Key) to defeat Bowser (Jack Black). Along the way, they’re joined by characters from the Mario-verse including Seth Rogen as Donkey Kong, Fred Armisen as Cranky Kong, and various other toads, penguins, and members of the Kong family.
The plot is paper-thin and primarily serves as a vehicle to deliver references and nostalgia. That’s not always a bad thing—some of the references have a kind of cleverness to them that we saw in movies like Shrek or Megamind.
At times, though, this movie really falls into the “I clapped because I recognize what that is” trend of references masquerading as jokes. Seeing something you’re familiar with and laughing because you understood the reference is not a joke in and of itself. Jokes are derived from story and dialogue more than just seeing something you remember from playing Mario on your SNES in the ‘90s.
What’s strange is that some of the references feel really dated beyond the usual nostalgia cash-in. An early reference to Kill Bill would have felt tired 15 years ago, so it feels really tired here. I was reminded of Granny doing moves from The Matrix in Space Jam: A New Legacy. We’ve seen it so many times in so many comedies! That joke can surely go live on a farm upstate at this point.
Similarly, this movie is filled with incredibly cliche needle drops. We all love “Take On Me” but it’s been used so many times in movies that I couldn’t help but roll my eyes when it started playing here. When you have a whole world of great music from the Mario games to choose from, why turn your soundtrack into “Now That’s What I Call Nostalgia Milking Vol. 86” instead? In the few minutes we do get fully orchestrated versions of the game music, it adds so much to the movie that it made me miss it even more when the film fell back into ‘80s music cliches.
The saving grace of The Super Mario Bros. Movie for me was the voice cast. Day and Key both have excellent voices for animation, though neither is given a ton to do here. The true standouts are Black and Rogen, who are able to bring their individual flare to their characters in a way that rises above the rest. The movie stops to highlight Rogen’s distinct laugh at one point and Black is given a couple of songs to showcase his unique skills. Both Bowser and Donkey Kong had me smiling when they were on screen thanks to those two performances.
Taylor-Joy gives a pretty expected Peach, though the movie is a little too proud of itself for taking her character from the typical damsel in distress we see in the games to a yassified girlboss. I can’t wait to see all the misogynists on Twitter lose their minds over this light corporate feminism.
It’s kind of funny how much of a big deal everyone made of Pratt’s casting because Mario is the exact type of generic hero Pratt usually plays in live-action movies. He exists more to move the plot forward than to be a full-fledged character. At one point, Peach literally introduces him saying, “This is Mario. He’s not important.” And Pratt’s performance is fine. He’s giving a little Brooklyn accent, but nothing too over-the-top, which is totally acceptable here.
If you’re deep in the Mario world and have played all the games, you’ll probably enjoy The Super Mario Bros. Movie because of the constant references and easter eggs. It’s fine to enjoy a heavy dose of nostalgia now and then. If you’re looking for something with a little more cleverness or hidden jokes for adults, Mario might not fit the bill for you. Either way, the target demographic (children) will probably have a good time with this one.
