Mortal Kombat 4K 2021 Ultra HD 2160p

In 1995, Paul W.C. Anderson ("Resident Evil") tried to adapt the cult fighting game and to some extent even succeeded, but the franchise did not go further than one film - all the sequels buried the idea of ​​the film series, and "Mortal Kombat" itself had been waiting for its new finest hour on the screens for more than 25 years ... Finally, it happened. But with a different director and some sort of claim to a real Hollywood action, not a b-movie, which we all love so much in Anderson's adaptation. The director was an Australian debutant film maker, the pool of five screenwriters is also not very experienced, and of the familiar actors here except Hiroyuki Sanada ("The Avengers") and Lewis Tan ("Deadpool 2"). In a word, an extremely dubious, but still inevitably expected project.

Mortal Kombat 4K Review
Cole Young - once a successful fighter, and now just a loser, fighting for $ 200 in some kind of semi-underground fights (most often ending in his defeat). Since childhood, he has a strange mole on his chest in the form of a circle with a dragon - a symbol of the "chosen ones", those who must defend the Earth from the ruler of the Outworld Shang Tsung at the mortal tournament Mortal Kombat (and Yang is also a descendant of the great warrior Hanzo Hasashi, this is also important ). However, the competition may not take place: the villain sends Sub-Zero to destroy all the chosen ones from Earth and prevent them from defending their planet from invasion. Only Cole himself, the former Marines Jax and Sonya Blade, the cunning mercenary Kano and the Shaolin monks Kung Lao and Liu Kang, who live in a hidden temple with Lord Raiden, survived. They need to quickly open their arcana (hidden powers bestowed by the very mark of the dragon) in order to resist the warriors of the Outworld.

If the synopsis of "Mortal Kombat" left you bewildered - do not be afraid, this is absolutely normal. In the plots of the original series of games, in general, the devil will break his leg: there everyone is dying, then reborn, children are fighting with grandchildren, grandchildren with great-grandchildren, in general, nothing is clear, and from time to time the franchise also contradicts itself. In Mortal Kombat, however, only a few people play for the sake of the plot - for the majority it is rather ideal entertainment for a party, a way to compete with friends with virtual forces and watch the spectacular bloody battles of various bizarre heroes. And in this sense, Simon McQuade's film captured the essence of the original perfectly.

This is a movie from fans and for fans, most of all in this sense it looks like not even the classic film adaptation of 95, but Duncan Jones' Warcraft. Both there and here it will be difficult for a viewer who is not familiar with the franchise: no one is going to explain anything and is not going to, everyone seems to understand everything, you sit alone and wonder why people around are clapping after some accidentally thrown phrase from a hero unfamiliar to you. In Mortal Kombat, a wild exposition with multiple worlds, upper gods and insane tournaments is not rationalized at all, but taken for granted. Even Cole - a character specially invented for the film and clearly created as a kind of guide for the viewer into the universe of the game - very easily accepts the whole circus with horses that has fallen on his head. He does not shout "No, this is impossible!" and does not go through the usual stages of bargaining and denial. Just think, well, gods, well, a four-armed monster, well, a guy lets fire from his hands - who does not happen to.

Mortal Kombat really looks like a fan movie - one of those that raise money on Kickstarter and then upload it to YouTube for free - and in a bad and in a good way. On the negative side, it's obvious how "cinema" in a snobbish sense doesn't work very well: a set of somehow connected action scenes designed to demonstrate a wide movement of each character. From the good - it is clear that the creators really blissed out, transferring another recognizable fatality to the screen or inserting the cult GET OVER HERE into the mouth of Scorpio.

In "Mortal Kombat" in general, there are a lot of points that indicate that the authors perfectly understand their audience and do not hesitate to wink at it (although there are fanservice mistakes: for example, Goro half the film is set up almost like the final boss, and as a result, they are drained in a few minutes ). Heroes comment on their victories with play phrases like Flawless Victory or Kano Wins, there is even a joke where a fighter complains about the enemy - they say that he constantly uses the same technique. It's a pity, there is no scene where one of the characters would say to the other: "Now, wait a second, let me try something."

The film perfectly understands what it wants to be - a perky "beshka" without complicated drama and with cool fights. It is difficult not to respect such cinematic sincerity, although it turns out that Mortal Kombat is only partly desired. It can be seen that good choreographers worked on the action scenes, and the actors understand what to do - and for once, the extreme cruelty of the game (albeit in a somewhat truncated form) made it to the film adaptation: Kung Lao here cuts enemies in two with his hat. -to release the guts, others take off their hands alive. But all this would have looked many times cooler, if not for the frankly lousy editing. Honestly, there is a feeling that each episode should have lasted a couple of times longer, but it was somehow shortened so as not to exceed the two-hour timekeeping - hence the torn cuts, and end-to-end frames, where the characters for some reason instantly move in space ... It's time for director Simon McQuade to start shouting about a McQuade cut somewhere in the studio's bins. And then, the hour is uneven, let's think that he is just a weak director.

Info Blu-ray
Video
Codec: HEVC / H.265
Resolution: Native 4K (2160p)
HDR: HDR10
Aspect ratio: 2.39:1
Original aspect ratio: 2.39:1

Audio
English: Dolby Atmos
English: Dolby Digital 5.1

Subtitles
English SDH, French, Spanish, Italian, Dutch, Mandarin (Simplified), Mandarin (Traditional), Korean.