Mortal Kombat II is a prime example of how much difference even a small improvement can make. It isn't particularly original, inventive, or even exciting, but it's never boring, which sets it apart from its predecessor. Some moments made me laugh with the film instead of at it, and for something as silly as this, that's a genuine compliment.
If the first film took itself too seriously, Mortal Kombat II is so self-aware that it almost veers into parody. At one point, Johnny Cage (Karl Urban) mocks an ancient relic by pretending it's the One Ring from Lord of the Rings, the franchise that made him a star. Your reaction to that will determine how well the other gags land.
At best, Mortal Kombat II is harmless fun. A movie so breezy it floats away on the wind and out of your mind the second it's over. At worst, it feels like a playthrough of the game with commentary provided by a superfan who runs out of material halfway through.
There is a plot, but it's so bare-bones it makes the games look like Dostoyevsky. Twenty years ago, Shao-Khan, who we know is evil because his helmet is a skull, took over Edenia after winning the Mortal Kombat tournament. Now, he aims to take over Earthrelm, apparently next on the list.
There is also the Netherrealm, which is hell, and there are gods, necromancers, and wizards. Superficially, Mortal Kombat is high fantasy in style, even when it doesn't do anything with that material.
The rules of the tournament are utterly meaningless, and there's little reason to reiterate them here. The foundation is there to bring back the round markers from the games, which are a fun visual easter egg for fans. For everyone else, thinking about how the rules work only muddies the waters. At one point, a character effectively calls a timeout, and somehow that works because the plot calls for it.
But this is Mortal Kombat, I hear you cry; we're not here for logic or plot. We're here for the fights and the gore, and everything else is secondary. Which would be fine, but Mortal Kombat II is light on both, and when it gets to either one, the results are less than stellar. At times, I forgot this was supposed to be a violent film.
The fights themselves are shot with a detached weightlessness that I wonder if it's to make editing airline editions easier. The fatalities from the games make an appearance, but even at IMAX, the effects are so murky that it was hard to tell what pieces were falling off at any given moment.
Director Simon McQuoid is still hopelessly lost when it comes to staging action, and even when he blatantly mimics the game for easy points, he doesn't find a single thing that sparks excitement like the source material.
Part of the problem is that most of his cast can't fight, and none of them are allowed to even fake it in a way that looks cool. Every action film is an illusion that requires the same amount of trickery and staging as a musical. A real fight is ugly business, nothing you want to cheer for. Even in something like Mortal Kombat, we want to marvel at the physical spectacle before someone gouges out an eye or two.
McQuoid gets part of the way there this time, which is once again an improvement. There are simple joys in recognizing the levels from the game and seeing favorite attacks replicated in a scene. But none of them connect in any way that's meaningful. The fights don't tell a story; they merely repeat sequences we could easily accomplish with a controller. It doesn't need to be poetry, even a limerick would do.
Karl Urban is terrific as a bitter, washed-up action star who is brought into the tournament in an almost Galaxy Quest-style setup. But he's also in his 50s, and not a martial arts expert. It is painfully obvious that his feet aren't rising above his waist, and the wide shots with his stunt double are hilariously obvious at times.
Compare any of his fights to the one between Ludi Lin and Max Huang, playing Liu Kang and Kung Lao, and it's like night and day. Lin and Huang are both experienced stage combat veterans, and theirs is the one moment in the film where McQuoid's staging doesn't trip over itself. It's not a great fight sequence, but it is so much better than anything else that it stands out nonetheless.
Far worse is how little the film gets out of Joe Taslim, a fantastic action star, who barely appears in the CGI-heavy sequence teased in the trailers. He and the great Hiroyuki Sanada return as Sub-Zero and Scorpion, but have nothing to do in an already overstuffed movie. They're here to fulfill a contractual obligation.
Surprisingly, the best bits in Mortal Kombat II have nothing to do with the action. Thanks to a scene-stealing performance from Josh Lawson as Kano, the best quips come when the demented Australian mercenary causes havoc among the rest of the cast. It's obvious the filmmakers realized his death in the first part was a mistake, so a lot of the script works overtime to compensate for even a brief absence.
Elsewhere, newcomer Baraka (CJ Bloomfield) is another happy surprise, bringing an unexpected amount of hilarity to a one-dimensional villain from the games. None of the gags are particularly new or clever, but it's still fun to see how Bloomfield and Urban throw themselves even to the silliest bit with gusto. Others, like Adeline Rudolph and Tati Gabrielle as Kitana and Jade, are charismatic and fun, but have little to do with their underwritten parts.
Mortal Kombat II is not the worst videogame adaptation out there. It isn't even the worst one this summer. But it does feel like another missed opportunity, despite its numerous improvements over the dire first one. The set design and fantasy elements are finally on the right side of silly, and the cast knows precisely what kind of film they're in.
But there's no adventure to speak of, and the action sequences aren't good enough to justify the two-hour runtime. As a result, Mortal Kombat II plays like the Mario Bros. movie for adults. A lot of empty calories and not much else.
