Street Fighter Live-Action Film Review

In 1987, the martial arts world was stunned when world champion muay thai master Sagat was defeated by a young up-and-coming martial artist named Ryu at the first ever World Warrior tournament. Despite Ryu's victory marking him as the greatest fighter in the world, he soon vanished into obscurity.

Now, in 1993, a talent scout named Chun Li is seeking out participants for a new World Warrior tournament, thrown by the eccentric dictator M. Bison. Chief among Chun Li's recruits? Ryu's estranged best friend Ken, a world-class talent losing himself in dubious novelty fights and advertising deals. Ken has no love left for Ryu. Ryu, whose victory in the first tournament came with terrible consequences, fears the fallout if he ever fights again. Chun Li has ulterior motives for helping Bison. And Bison himself wants far more and far worse than a good fight. Thus, the stage is set for the fight of Ryu, Ken, and company's lives.

In 1987, the martial arts world was stunned when world champion muay thai master Sagat was defeated by a young up-and-coming martial artist named Ryu at the first ever World Warrior tournament. Despite Ryu's victory marking him as the greatest fighter in the world, he soon vanished into obscurity.

Now, in 1993, a talent scout named Chun Li is seeking out participants for a new World Warrior tournament, thrown by the eccentric dictator M. Bison. Chief among Chun Li's recruits? Ryu's estranged best friend Ken, a world-class talent losing himself in dubious novelty fights and advertising deals. Ken has no love left for Ryu. Ryu, whose victory in the first tournament came with terrible consequences, fears the fallout if he ever fights again. Chun Li has ulterior motives for helping Bison. And Bison himself wants far more and far worse than a good fight. Thus, the stage is set for the fight of Ryu, Ken, and company's lives.

Two things are true about Kitao Sakurai's Street Fighter. The first is that it has some genuinely strong points and worthy craft. The second is that it is a frequently bizarre, off-putting, at times downright baffling movie. At its best, it's a neat showcase for the ways that medium-hopping can serve as a storytelling tool, a worthy stage for the great martial artist and actor Andrew Koji, and a reminder that HEALTH are a superb band. At its most flummoxing, it jumps between tones with little rhyme or reason, refuses to give its stories the space they need to be told, and makes creative decisions to which the only appropriate response is “bwuh?”

Broadly speaking, Street Fighter uses the martial arts tournament at its core as a narrative engine. M. Bison (David Dastmalchian, a good actor doing perfectly fine work that simply cannot measure up to the late Raúl Juliá's 1994 take on the villain) wants to gather powerful fighters so that he can harvest the mystic embodiment of their might for himself. The fighters who answer his call each have their own reasons for competing, be they venal, noble, or just plain personal. Ryu (Andrew Koji, lead of Cinemax and HBO's much-missed Warrior) and Ken (Noah Centineo, Black Adam) receive the majority of the focus, followed by Callina Liang (Presence)'s Chun Li and Andrew Schulz (a comedian who's repeatedly made an ass of himself)'s Dan Hibiki. Wrestler Joe “Roman Reigns” Anoa'i's Akuma serves as a looming threat and plays a key, late-film role. Many of the extended ensemble get spotlight moments.

Even accounting for the fact that they're the main characters, Koji and Centineo get the most to work with in terms of both narrative and action. Both acquit themselves well as voice actors during Street Fighter's extensive animated flashback sequences (produced by animation studio Titmous and consistently gorgeous). In the live-action present, the duo successfully sell Ryu and Ken's failed friendship as important and painful to both. Ryu is exasperated by Ken's descent into a Jolt Cola-shilling clown who wastes his talent on obliterating cars with his bare hands. Ken is trying to find the right words to make Ryu explain an apparent moment of weakness that shattered their bond. Director Kitao Sakurai and fight coordinator Anthony Rinna (Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings) use the fraught chemistry Koji and Centineo build to give their fights punch. When Ryu, exasperated by Ken's nonsense, has to dodge a tantrum his ex-pal throws, Koji's dry frustration makes his nonchalant dodges and thoughtful counters all the more funny. When Ken finally gets the answers he's spent years wanting and finds that the only response eloquent enough lies in his fists, Centineo's fury feels genuine. When they join forces, Koji, Centineo and their stunt collaborators show that while both men practice the same art, they've each made it their own. Ryu watches for openings and aims for decisive strikes. Ken rushes his foes down before they can respond. It's darn good action storytelling.

While Street Fighter's action is at its best when Koji and Centineo share the screen, it's solid stuff, blending clear, distinct choreography with colorful VFX work. Liang's two-on-one battle with Rayna Vallandingham's Juli and Orville Peck's Vega is a highlight. Composers Leo Birenberg and Zach Robinson back the action with an energetic score, aided by all-time industrial rockers HEALTH, who contribute two excellent tracks (“NEGATIVE EDGE” and “BRAINROT”).

But, for all that Street Fighter does well, there's plenty that it does either bafflingly or outright poorly. Ryu and Ken's shared story, which includes the majority of the film's animated flashbacks, is played and succeeds dramatically. The rest of the story is goofier. This is not an inherently bad thing. Street Fighter's long had a silly side (for a recent example from the games, see Ryu's fumbling attempts to learn how to text). The trouble is that the silliness is an incoherent, often off-putting muddle. Chun Li's search for vengeance is nominally as dramatic as Ryu and Ken's arc, but it's constantly undercut by a bizarre series of running gags about almost everyone she meets lusting after her. It goes past indulging the male gaze, and seems genuinely amused by the fact that Chun Li's Interpol partner (Kyle Mooney) reacts to her stomping him by gleefully declaring that he accepts his punishment. Multiple people either lick Chun Li or try to lick her. It is less played fetishistically than it is fundamentally amusing that multiple people with assorted kinks are sexually attracted to a beautiful martial artist. At a generous read, it might be an attempt at metacommentary on Chun Li's long-standing status as a sex symbol, but in practice it's confusing, off-putting, and unsexy. Equally groan-inducing are the numerous jokes about how inherently funny buff men in intimate, martial arts-based relationships are (mostly directed at Cody Rhodes' Guile, and to a lesser extent Dan). Just because Street Fighter is set in 1993 does not mean that it needs to reheat jokes that were stale in 1993.

At the same time, there's a running gag about a newscaster played by Eric André being repeatedly threatened with violent death and repeatedly subjected to humiliations. Andre balances being gleefully loud and sincerely terrified for his life. It's a compelling performance, and funny, but it also feels like something left over from a script where Bison was more actively involved in his day job as a murderous dictator than he is in the finished film. Indeed, there is so much nonsense going on so constantly in Street Fighter that it gets exhausting, even a bit baffling to watch. Characters get extensive screen time, but perilously little to do. Mel Jarnson's Cammy fares the worst. She gets to slink around menacingly, and that's it. Vallandingham, at least, gets a cool fight with Liang, but between Jarnson's non-presence, Vallandingham's under-use, and Liang being stuck with whatever the film's “tee hee, isn't it funny that people find Chun Li, who is among other things, a famous video game sex symbol, sexy” thing is, Street Fighter consistently does poorly by the women in its cast.

Amidst the nonsense, Koji's driven, troubled Ryu is a balm. He's excellent, a warrior trying to make a grave wrong right, even as he's afraid to admit it to himself. Centineo, meanwhile, has his share of Street Fighter's goofiness to deal with (see: Jolt Cola), but he skillfully integrates it into Ken's arc about recovering his dignity, and he's comfortable playing a fool. The two work well together, and Street Fighter owes many of its successes to their fine turns as individual performers and a duo.

Koji and Centineo, and the animated flashbacks, are worth seeing. HEALTH's two songs, and the soundtrack as a whole, make for a good listen. For folks who enjoy silliness, there's silliness aplenty. With that said, those bright points share a film with a series of bizarre, unsuccessful, sour, and at times downright obnoxious creative choices. There's good stuff in Street Fighter, but there are better ways to enjoy it. The soundtrack stands on its own. 1994's Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie is a blast. The 2019-2023 TV series Warrior, which was based on Bruce Lee's writings, saw Andrew Koji kick ass and take names alongside a murderer's row of talented actors and martial artists for three glorious seasons. And of course, there's the games themselves and all their glories, from II and its many evolutions to III's famous moment 37 to the ongoing 6. Street Fighter's successes are real, and its successful oddities welcome in a time where too often big-budget blockbusters stick strictly to formulas. But its failures are just as real. They don't drown Street Fighter's high points, but they are a constant, significant drag. Keep that in mind.