User Reviews

The Super Mario Brothers games are still great fun. Admittedly they are light on plot, almost simplistic, but they are imaginative, lots of fun and thrilling with memorable characters and interaction.

'Super Mario Bros' did have a good deal of potential, with talented actors like Bob Hoskins, Fiona Shaw, Samantha Mathis and Dennis Hopper on board, and it was always going to be interesting to see whether the film would be able to make an interesting story that didn't have a huge amount of narrative material to work from. Unfortunately, it is a real let down, and was doomed from the start from trying to do too much and from its notoriously troubled behind-the-scenes.

Video game/interactive film adaptations have a very dubious record, always giving a sense that video/interactive games don't translate well to film, and 'Super Mario Bros' is not an exception. This said, in general there are far worse films out there, while it misses more than it hits 'Super Mario Bros' has a few good spots. Some of the photography is good. Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo do their best in the lead roles and both do a more than respectable job especially Hoskins. Their chemistry and rapport is enjoyable if at times rather too father and son than brothers. Alan Silvestri's score while in want of more recognisable themes for fans is well-suited for the film and has a nice rousing energy, atmosphere and whimsy. Good song choices too.

However, 'Super Mario Bros' has several problems that stop it from being the thrill ride it could have been. The rest of the cast don't really impress that much. Dennis Hopper is always a great pleasure in over-the-top roles, particularly villain ones and when he loses it, and on paper he did seem an ideal choice. The thing is though with a role like Frank Booth in 'Blue Velvet', Hopper was not only over-the-top but also terrifying and the character was interesting, here in 'Super Mario Bros' as King Koopa Hopper is a large piece of unsubtle ham and that's it and there are some points where he's almost subdued, sometimes you expect Hopper to lose his rag and it doesn't really happen. His dialogue also further dumbs down the character, making King Koopa very much a missed opportunity as a villain. Samantha Mathis has some moments of heart and charm but is pretty bland on the whole, while Fiona Shaw at times comes close to out-hamming Hopper. The Goombas are sometimes sort of fun, but sometimes pointless and too goofy.

It is a shame really that the film's production troubles come through loud and clear in the film itself. The direction has a very inexperienced and erratic feel, and like the directors had no idea what to do with the film. The same is with the story, granted credit is due for trying to do something with source material that doesn't give them an awful lot to work with and it's very energetic in pace and never dull. Unfortunately, there is the sense that the writers didn't know which direction to go or how to start, with target demographic/audience and what it wanted to be never really clear (despite also being a bad film with many huge problems, 'Street Fighter' at least got that right). 'Super Mario Bros' constantly feels rushed, bloated, over-complicated and like there was too much going on, and further sadly not all of it was necessary or made sense as a result of not being explored enough. Exposition is also garbled, so that it has nothing to do with the games other than a few clumsily inserted references which reeked of trying to squeeze them in when this fact was realised in production.

As well as lacking in thrills, as a result of the over-crowded and over-complicated story, there is a lack of fun and imagination. The jokes are too juvenile and too embarrassingly awkward to be any fun, and only succeeds in dumbing down so many of the characters (a huge part as to why King Koopa is lacking as a villain). In fact, the script generally was poor, with childish and sometimes misplaced humour and dialogue that clunks badly. Action is very jagged and stop-start. Apart from in the photography and in a couple of neat effects, the expensive for back then budget is not hugely obvious in the production values, where interference and production troubles are second most obvious after the story. The sets are cluttered, too small in scale and quite drab and lacking in colour or dazzle, the world is never fully immersed and others have said it looks like a cheaper and dumbed down 'Blade Runner' which this reviewer agrees with. A lot of the effects are slapdash even for the early pre-'Jurassic Park' 90s.

Overall, has some good assets but, while it is not as horrendous as the universal critical and commercial failure on release and as its reputation suggests, too much of it is lacking for it to be the thrill-ride it had the potential of being with the right execution. 4/10 Bethany Cox

This is one of those films where it's more fun to hear about how it was created than actually watching it.

It's not as bad as people like to think, so let's just hope in the future they give the same sort of love to a Mario movie as they did for Mortal Kombat, or even Sonc.

I actually enjoyed this movie, despite the terrible reviews and the terrible user ratings. Its plot is fair, it's effects are great, even for now, and the acting, although certainly not brilliant, is fair enough to work with the plot. I'd give it a 7/10.

I made the mistake of watching this movie the day i had knee surgery. So i was doped up on all kinds of pain killers and thought the movie was great. However a few years later i remembered how much i enjoyed the movie so i watched on tv when it was run agian. I was blown away with how horribly bad it was. I was also amazed on how much i remembered being in the movie that wasnt. so as the title says be careful how you watch. As a side note this is not an endorsement to do drugs just to make bad movies better.

Super Mario Bros. is a movie based off of the Super Mario Bros. video games. Or at least, that's what they SAY it is. In reality, Super Mario Bros. is a movie that pretends to be Mario. He's what I'm talking about: In the games, the main villain is Bowser, King of the Koopas who wishes to kidnap the Princess and rule the mushroom kingdom. In the movie, the main villain is Koopa, tyrant of a small city in the center of a world-wide desert who wishes to take over the world of man. In the games, a big bertha is a fish. In the movie, Big Bertha is the bouncer at the Boom Boom bar. In the games, Boom Boom is a person. The movie is just a crappy movie that takes Nintendo's names in an attempt to look better. And it fails at that. DO NOT see this movie.

Super Mario Bros (1993) was a flop on release and still holds up a pretty bad shape to this day! The dystopian cyberpunk world sure contained great art and set design, but the main characters failed to match the iconic video game heroes Mario & Luigi. Bob Hoskins as chief plumber Mario was a great decision for the lead role and he even performed an Italian accent. On the other hand John Leguizamo as Luigi didn't even try to change his Latino voice and didn't amuse me with clumsy walks. Dennis Hopper is super versatile in this one. Alan Silvestri's OST is way too classical and repeats his success of "Back In The Future" with obvious musical events following the scenes where surprises are going to happen.

The story relies on the theory that an alien fungus is responsible for all live on earth which definitely is an interesting plot for the franchise. But the execution was terrible.

Super Mario Bros. (1993), was another case of the source material, for a film idea, being too advanced for the cinematic technology of the day. CGI was just starting with Jurassic Park (1993), so the choice to do this film with practical, physical effects and live action characters was its major downfall. This prompted the story to be adjusted to fit the capabilities of the filmmakers of the day. It all culminates into a silly plot, that actually manages to make video game characters, caricatures of themselves. This however, isn't a knock on the special effects used in this film at all. The effects fit the pre-CGI era fairly well. They did a very good job with the special effects, art direction, set design and most of the costumes and make-up. There actually is a dinosaur in the film and the computer effects used for him are pretty good. For 1993, it is visually pleasant.

Dennis Hopper, as President Koopa (Bowser), looks ridiculous though. There also is this weird use of the fungus in the film. It looks bad technically and isn't menacing at all. Many of the characters are pail, empty and mindless, especially Samantha Mathis as Princess Daisy. It doesn't translate well, especially having to depict Mario (Bob Hoskins) and Luigi (John Leguizamo), running around Brooklyn. The attempt to make the film as real as possible backfires. I never got a chance to see this film when it was first released, but I had heard of the negative fallout that came after it was released. I remember when Siskel and Ebert gave it two thumbs down. Most film-buffs remember hearing, that Bob Hoskins hated the movie. This is probably why I never got around to seeing Super Mario Bros. (1993), until the 2023 film was announced. 30 years later I finally understood. This film is a failure, but I still recommend seeing it, at least once, as a curiosity, because you have to see it to believe it.

3.9 (F+ MyGrade) = 4 IMDB.

This is one of those movies I loved as a thirteen year old, I remember seeing it a few times. It was a film naturally aimed at my age group in 1993, I wish people would remember that when writing up such serious reviews. It's quite a fun story, the special effects are probably a little naff thirty years later, but what do you expect? Bob Hoskins is good fun.

I'm surprised by just how dark the story is, funny how you have a different look on things when you're young.

What I found interesting, was the theme music, Almost Unreal by Roxette, what an awesome track, arguably the best aspect of the film.

Fun, 7/10.

I have a soft spot for this movie. It ain't a good movie, like, at all. It's a Hollywood Trainwreck, but it's a trainwreck I'd watch over and over. I personally like Bob Hoskins as Mario, even if he thinks it was his worst part. The film is terrible, but in a very entertaining and delightful way. I recommend this film to anyone who gets a kick out of bad movies. If not, just stick to the NES classic.

Yes, this no classic, but it's not that bad. And yes it bears no resemblance to the video games that inspired it except for the jumpsuits that look like the heroes overalls, but it's not bad.

Mario & Luigi (Bob Hoskins & John Leguizamo) are the two down on their luck brother plumbers who get involved with a college student named Daisy (Samantha Mathis) who turns out to be a princess from an alternate dimension. Once transported there themselves, they must fight the evil King Koopa (Dennis Hopper) and save their world from being merged with Koopa's and the human race from being turned into monkeys.

It may be hard to believe that John Leguizamo is Bob Hoskins brother, but the two have good chemistry and John has a convincing Brooklyn accent (although Tom Selleck would have been a more convincing Luigi in some respects). Bob reprises his gruff detective persona from "Who Framed Roger Rabbit" to great effect. Samantha Mathis is cute as the princess and manages to feel less shallow than most heroines in these situations. Dennis Hopper hams it up as the film's villain. Lots of gags and good natured humor, and a beautiful song from Roxette, "Almost Unreal". Worth a rental.

Rating: 1.0

One of the worst video game adaptations ever made. Just look at mario's design, and the goombas design. It was like a crappy middle school play. Just stick to the games.

Why does this film have such a low rating? Sure it may not be along the storylines of the Super Mario Bros. game for the NES back in '85, but in my opinion, it has to be one of the best films I have ever seen. Some noticeable changes are in this film, such as that the princess' name is Daisy, and she's being held in a tower instead of a castle. There's plenty of fungus and mushrooms around, but I think that the storyline is actually improved from the game, because if it were exactly like the game, it would be just running round, bashing blocks, grabbing coins and eating mushrooms all the way, which would eventually just become boring. This film has variety, like in a real world, there are phone boxes, houses, restaurants, and much more than just pipes, flags and castles. It just also happens that my favourite actor, Bob Hoskins, has the main role as Mario, which makes this film more appealing and exciting. There are also things from the Mario games in the film such as Bob-Ombs (licensed by Reebok, mysteriously), and Goomba Shoes that are powered by Bullet Bills. So to top it off, this has to be one of the best films ever made, and one of my all-time favourites.

So, *this* is what the movie of a SMB game should've looked like: Mario and Luigi, two lovable, Laurel-and-Hardy-esque plumbers from New York, take a job that involves a large, green pipe. By some unfortunate accident, they fall into the opening... only to emerge in a lush, flowering land full of verdant views and large, Alice-in-Wonderland-ish mushrooms. After meeting Toad, an ebullient native of this strange land, they learn that their princess has been kidnapped by a large, spiky-shelled creature named King Koopa. Vowing to earn their return to the home they know by rescuing this princess, Mario and Luigi overcome both the natural challenges of the environment of the Mushroom Kingdom as well as the attempts by Koopa's minions to thwart their advance. After overcoming the tests of mettle and might, and finding their way through labyrinthine castles, Koopa is defeated and the princess is found.

See now, how hard was that? The game *itself* has pretty much everything you need to make a movie about it... sure, you'd need some witty dialogue and an awful lot of special effects, but it's nothing that, say, *43 MILLION DOLLARS* couldn't do.

What you *don't* need are spurious and inane spring-loaded-rocket-jumping shoes, unnecessary connections to *wildly inaccurate* representations of evolutionary theory, awkward attempts to smoosh poor representations of unimportant baddies from every game into an hour and a half, or Dennis Hopper. They can jump high because it's a parallel universe, goombas are just creatures that evolved from whatever other creatures there were millions of years ago in that universe, and King Koopa is giant, spiky-shelled thing that looks *absofreakinglutely nothing* like Dennis Hopper. No, a spiky blond dye job on your head does not make you look like an evil reptilian tyrant - and it doesn't take the place of a shell.

Sadly, the Super Mario Bros. Movie makes the same mistake that virtually every other video-game movie has made: it flagrantly and arbitrarily makes stuff up that not only doesn't have *anything* to do with the game, but furthermore seems to perversely go so far off-course from the fun and adventurous tone of its source material as to make my childhood memories grit their teeth and softly weep.

I guess this movie was doomed from the start. It must have been a more savage hang over than usual in the plant of "bad movie ideas" when the whole idea of live action Super Mario film was conceived. I mean you all know the settings and story of Mario games right? A plump plumber in his red overalls jumping in the heads of mushrooms and turtles, I mean Koopas, and trying to save the princess. There just isn't any way, you could even try to turn that something else than a cartoon. It just doesn't work out too well as live action.

But they did try, with a force of a four different directors, and yet they still failed. Or maybe that was the main reason why they did.

The story has changed so, that Mario (Bob Hoskins) and Luigi (John Leguizamo), two brothers, who look nothing a like, come through a dimensional gate to the mushroom kingdom, where they must defeat the evil Koopa (Dennis Hopper) and save the princess (Samantha Mathis) and the king (Lance Henriksen).

It's not that there would be a bad cast in the film. In fact the line up is rather good, even solid as some might say. It's just the execution of the film that pushes this towards the oblivion it deserves to be in.

You can watch it for the sake of interest, but it really takes a good bunch of Mystere Science Theatre minded friends to do so correctly. I gave it two out of ten just for the sake of the cast. You just can't beat Hopper as a mad Koopa... Or Hoskins as Mario.

The incredible Bob Hoskins and the hilarious John Leguizamo star in the 1993 adaptation of the popular video game "Super Mario Bros." A lot of people haven't heard of this film, and for some good reasons- it was a critical and commercial failure, seems to only exist as a cult film now, has been disowned by many of its stars, and for it's greatest offense- complete and total disregard for its source material.

The games were essentially fantasy, taking place in the magical Mushroom Kingdom ruled by Princess "Peach" Toadstool, and teaming with the various other character who inhabit it (such as Toad, Yoshi and of course Mario and Luigi, plumbers). The evil King Koopa (or "Bowser") will occasionally attack in some attempt to conquer the kingdom, but the heroic brothers Mario and Luigi are always there to stop him. That's about it for the story- it's very basic, very simple. It works. It's a tried and true formula. Just your basic knight-in-shining-armor-saving-the-day.

You'd think something so basic would be impossible to mess up. Somehow, this film did just that.

Directors Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel (apparently with help from several other uncredited directors) along with a team of writers brought this film to the masses. While the games were bright, colorful fantasy with a simple story, Morton/Jankel completely twisted the entire story into a sort of dark-yet-childish Sci-Fi "What if?" about New York City and parallel dimensions and dinosaurs who escaped extinction. The opening scene of the film alone changes the entire set-up for the story, and within 5 minutes, you could easily forget you're even watching an alleged Mario movie.

But I'll get back to the blatant source-material slaughter later, and address the movie on its own (limited) merits now.

The film starts out with a "flashback" that theorizes that the meteor which "killed" the dinosaurs instead created a rift and an alternate dimension where the dinosaurs were transported, and able to evolve into intelligent, human-like beings. We then see the feared dictator of this alternate dimension, King Koopa (Dennis Hopper) pursuing a woman in our world, trying to get back a shard of the meteor- though it's never fully explained, re-inserting this shard into the meteor will merge both dimensions, and allow Koopa to take over our world. The woman drops off a large egg at a church, before appearing to die, while Koopa is sent back to his world. The egg hatches, and a human baby female is found inside.

Years later, the "Mario Bros." (although in this film, they are changed into adoptive father/son figures), owners of a small plumbing business in Manhattan, are dealing with frustration with a rival- Scapelli Construction, who seems to be stealing most of their work.

The baby has grown into Daisy, a beautiful young archaeologist who is excavating dinosaur fossils around the Brooklyn Bridge. She and Luigi meet and fall in love, and one night, Luigi and Mario are forced to pursue her after she is kidnapped by Iggy and Spike, minions of Koopa. They get pulled through an inter-dimensional portal, and end up in Dinohattan (or so I've heard it called), the other-dimension's equivalent of Manhattan. From there on in, it's basically a rescue-the-damsel-in-distress tale, and is more of a light Sci-Fi adventure than a true Mario tale.

To give credit where credit is due, there are some good things about this film. For one, the effects are nice and unique, especially for an early 90's film. The production design is quite cool, Alan Silverstri's score is "Mario-esque", and the visuals are generally interesting and fun to look at. The cast kinda, sorta works in its own way, and Hoskins/Leguizamo are a ton of fun as the leads.

But the movie also does so much wrong. For one thing, as mentioned before, the film totally ignores the games, outside of using character names. There is no Mushroom Kingdom (the setting of the games), all of the animal characters are now human, the brothers are no longer brothers, too much time is spent in the "real world", they used the little-known Daisy character from the games instead of Princess Toadstool (Mario's love interest) so the younger "brother" could get the girl and appeal to the audience, Mario and Luigi's jumping ability are now the work of futuristic shoes. Nothing is designed to look remotely the same. It was like the filmmakers tried their hardest to do anything except make a faithful movie.

Also, the film is full of other problems- a large portion of the humor is not funny. A lot of the direction is sloppy. A lot of plot points are poorly written. Dennis Hopper is pretty atrocious as Koopa. The rules are not clearly established. Etc. In addition, the movie tries too much to wink and nod to the fans- at one point, Luigi even talks about being a video-gamer. It felt like they were trying to make a movie about people who play Mario Bros., rather than an actual Mario Bros. movie... an even in that respect, the movie fails overall.

This film was fun for me as 5-year-old when it first came out, as I had no real grasp on anything, and was wowed by the cool visuals. In retrospect, though, it's apparent animosity towards it's source material, and it's other faults are impossible to ignore. I have no problem with filmmakers changing some things for an adaptation, but this was ridiculous- they changed everything, and didn't even do a good job at it. Even if the movie wasn't based on "Super Mario Bros.", it would have stunk because it's too sloppy and too basic.

While not atrocious, this film is still pretty bad. A 4 out of 10 just for the cool set/visual design, and the fun leads. It's worth watching once for hardcore fans just to see how wrong they got the story/tone, but only if you can see it for free.

I'm sorry, but the movie version of Super Mario Bros. just didn't do any justice to the classic video game. The plot didn't seem to click, the references to the actual games were few, and the characters? Well, Mario and Luigi were well-done, but the Koopas just weren't. All in all, we old-school gamers deserved better when we wanted to see our wrench-toting heroes on the silver screen.

This movie is much hated practically everywhere and of course I can understand why. Basically everyone from the '70's , 80's and 90's generation grew up with playing Nintendo games and the Super Mario games in particular. However when one sees this movie, it becomes pretty obvious early on that this movie has almost nothing to do with the Super Mario video games. The atmosphere, settings and characters are totally different, which is probably the main and also only reason why this movie was and still is hated among so many all over the world.

However, when one has to look at this movie with a fair and unbiased view, one has to come to the conclusion that this movie is good decent entertainment. No, it's not a GREAT movie but it does serve its purpose and that is to provide the viewer with 104 minutes of mindless, simple entertainment.

Kids will most likely like this movie best. The story is wonderfully adventurous and it all is very childishly simple constructed. I mean, the story and setting all basically have very little to do with the games but when you just have to judge the story, it's a pretty good and well thought out one. If the main characters were, let's say, some average Manhattan plumbers named the William's brothers and the entire movie wasn't based on a series of video games, than perhaps the movie would had received a far better reception and would had entertained and reached a wider audience.

All of the characters are pretty entertaining and work out well in the movie. This is probably mainly due to the well known cast. Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo are the Mario brothers and they form a pretty good main duo. Dennis Hopper also is in his element as the ruthless, over-the-top, stereotyped villain King Koopa. He gives the movie a certain extra fun and flair. Other well known actors in the movie are Fiona Shaw, Gianni Russo (Carlo Rizzi from the first two The Godfather movies) and Lance Henriksen in a very small cameo role.

Unlike the games, the movie is a dark one. All of the sets are dark which was perhaps not the greatest atmospheric mood for the story and the entire movie in general. All of the sets are disappointing, small and unimaginative looking. Same goes for the costumes and most of the make-up effects. The movie however has some good and convincing looking early special effects. Remember folks, that it was 1993 when this movie was released.

The movie however is most of the time a bit too childishly told and the dialogs are below par and too simple.

The pace and editing is good but the movie severely lacks some action and real interesting moments. At moments it takes too long before something good or interesting happens again, which makes this movie perhaps a bit boring and uninteresting to watch at certain points.

All in all it's a not very successful- but still yet entertaining first attempt at making a movie based on a video game. Certainly better than some of those movies based on video games, released this present day!

6/10

http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

Maybe it's my child memories loving it that makes me mad about the 4.1. Maybe it's seeing truly garbage movies hit the big screen in recent years. Maybe it's knowing that people took this movie way to seriously to give it 1s and 2s and such. Maybe I'm rambling just to let them allow me to post this review and rating. Maybe like 800 characters is an absolutely ridiculous amount of letters required to send in a review. I have wrote college essays that were around this length. Yeah maybe not all of them an A. But hey! In the end I passed and graduated. I'm almost there now. Getting very very close. Got It.

It is clear that this film has been unfairly dismissed. OK, so it doesn't fit the criteria of a 'good film', but, it's a great kids film. It's dark and strange, things generally uncommon of kids films, and, if it wasn't for watching this film as a child, I wouldn't be into people like cronenberg, lynch and, in particular, Gilliam, whose sinister darkness I enjoy so greatly.

It is self-evident that there is a lack of imagination, especially recently, in the kids film genre, and this is where Super Mario Brothers earns the 7 out of 10 that I have given it. My film collection would be much less exciting without having watched this film as a child. This is why I urge those of you who have given it a poor rating to re-evaluate, considering what I have said.