Tekken

Okay just finished watching this and wow is it bad. I could sit here and kick the heck out've it for not being faithful to the game, which hooo boy it isn't, but then all I'll get is a bunch of people going "It's Tekken The Movie, NOT Tekken The Game!".

So I'll review it as a simple action movie. The plot was thin, the character motivations were practically nil and the fight scenes were shot with far too many cuts. The acting ranged from over the top to poor.

Interestingly for a movie that did not in any way respect the storyline of the game, it went out of it's way to include homages to it. Hell entire characters were in it for no more than that. Anna Williams didn't have a fight or indeed even a line! She existed for no other reason to name drop and to wander about in her underwear. While we're on the subject of the Williams sister's what the heck is wrong with Nina's face?!? I have no idea if this is true, but it looks like it's been constructed in the operating theatre, apologies if it wasn't, but DAMN.

They also managed to incorrectly spell Cung Le's name in the credits.

Not for Tekken fans as they'll get angry, not for action movie fans as they'll get bored.

"You will fight, the world will watch, and my legacy will be written with your blood."

Tekken actually wasn't half-bad. I'm as surprised to be saying that as you probably are to be reading it. 

It probably helped that the bar is so low for video game adaptations, and that the last such movie I saw was King of Fighters, which was awful to an absurd degree. Tekken can't help but look good in comparison to that. It helps that it makes at least an effort to keep some of the story and characters from the games, while offering frequent decent, if not great, fight scenes. The overuse of flashbacks gets a little old, but that's a much more minor issue than I was expecting Tekken to have.

I have to mention that Tekken looks pretty good, with some impressive sets and a slick, high-budget veneer. The main actors are adequate, with John Foo as Jin being a capable fighter and believable enough as an earnest and ultimately good-hearted guy. Kelly Overton doesn't have a lot to do other than look hot in her greatly revised role as Christie, but she's infinitely qualified in that particular area. She does okay in her action scenes, too. Ian Anthony Dale is appropriately villainous as Kazuya, and everyone else is at least acceptable. 

Tekken is basically just another fighting tournament movie, placed in a video game setting. But, that's all it really needs to be. The story is simple and straight-forward, and I think that's a good thing. Keep in mind that this isn't supposed to be a 100% accurate adaptation of the game, and it'll probably entertain you.

Boring watch, probably won't watch again, and can't recommend.

I tried and fell asleep on this 3 times. There is plenty of things happening, but who cares, really?

The movie goes far out of the way to disconnect the audience from the characters, world and action.

Maybe I'll update this if I can ever get through it, but I can't see it being better than what I think it is right now.

Unless you're just a big Tekken fan, go watch "Dead or Alive" instead.

When I was a child there was 3 video games that to this day will always go down in history as my favorite games ever made. One of those games happened to be Tekken. When I first heard about this movie I was pretty psyched. To be honest, I didn't really know what to expect. To say the least I wasn't "Butt Hurt" but I wasn't happy either. From the perspective of somebody who has never played the games before, this would in fact be a good film. However, from the perspective of somebody who has played the games... I found myself saying "omg what are you guys doing this isn't how that happened" almost every 5 minutes in this film. I guess I now know how those guys who say "The book was better" feel. A lot of the Tekken characters in this movie where completely out of character compared to the character they portray in the gaming world. Like I said though, I can see how someone who has never played the console games could enjoy this movie. Aside from all that, the content of the film as story progress wise was forced. The action is what made up for that downside. With all that being said as a loyal Tekken fan. I either hope A. They make an anime movie out of Tekken that sticks true to the roots or B. Does this movie some justice in a Hollywood remake. They're going to need to take a completely different approach if they want to attract the interests of the hardcore fans.

While there was reason to dislike the movie from both fan-based point- of-views (Lack of characters from a game that has quite a healthy roster, especially the absence of two main characters/transformations that could have been an obvious choice for the final bout) and movie critics point-of-view (scene inconsistencies, story), I can honestly say I enjoyed the movie. I didn't take any notice of the 'goofs' that were listed on this site while I was watching the film. Characters were imitated to a decent quality and the action was quite solid. But I feel what most critics are forgetting, is that yes a 'good movie' requires a good plot..or so that's what the critics seem to believe.. This is based off a FIGHTING game. A fighting game that also focuses more on fighting than story. So you shouldn't expect much more from a movie based on just that. To sum it up, I thoroughly enjoyed it but don't actually take my word for it.. In fact don't take any critic's word for it. I know from personal experience that only you will know whether you will enjoy a movie or not. People have different opinions and this is merely my opinion. I would be interested in an open-discussion about this movie anyways though :)

POSSIBLE SPOILER ALERT:

I WANT A SEQUEL! I feel like there's a love triangle going on that needs to develop/conclude in the next movie. Also I want to see more fighters..especially devil,devil jin,ogre,jinpachi. And Heihachi Mishima is NOT dead ;)