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Street Fighter (Extreme Edition)

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    Ian Jane
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  • Street Fighter (Extreme Edition)

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    Released by: Universal Studios
    Released on: 2/10/09
    Director: Steven de Souza
    Cast: Jean Claude Van Damme, Raul Julia
    Year: 1994
    Purchase From Amazon

    The Movie:

    Based on the popular video game series of the same name, Steven de Souza's 1994 action/martial arts crap-fest Street Fighter stars Jean Claude Van Damme as Colonel William F. Guile, a commando who leads a small group of fighters into the country of Shadaloo where he hopes to find and put a stop to an evil militant type named General Bison (Raul Julia). It seems Bison has recently taken a trio of soldiers hostage and that Guile intends to get them back. Bison, on the other hand, has used one of his captors, Charlie Blanka (Robert Mammone), as a guinea pig in a genetic experiment that has turned him into a monster thanks to the efforts of an evil scientist named Dhalism (Roshan Seth).

    While Guile and his team are doing their thing, a reporter named Chun Li (Ming-Na) who has her own axe to grind with Bison, who killed her father years ago. Since she and Guile are after the same man, it makes sense for them to team up and join forces. Guile gathers up a few rascally fighters named Ryu (Byron Mann), Ken (Damian Chapa), Hawk (Gregg Rainwater), Cammy (Kylie Minogue), Vega (), E. Honda (Peter Tuiasosopo), Balrog (Grand L. Bush) and Sagat (Wes Studi) to help him in his quest. The soon find themselves in a race against time though, as Bison has decided to kill his hostages unless he's paid twenty billion dollars!

    From the opening newscast (in which Global News Television tells us of the 'crisis in Shadaloo') through to the fight scenes, wardrobe, the script and the acting, Street Fighter is a bad movie. A very, very, very bad movie, in fact. Now it's rare that anyone really expects a video game adaptation to be particularly good but even by the admittedly low standards of the genre this one stinks, which is a shame because on the surface it's a fast paced and enjoyably colorful film. The picture can certainly be enjoyed as a guilty pleasure, call it 'so bad it's good if you like, but there's no way to sugar coat the stench that emanates from this cinematic dung heap.

    To his credit, Raul Julia does as good a job as anyone could have possibly done as the villain. He's hamming it up throughout and it's fun to watch him chew through the scenery. Unfortunately, casting against the incredibly wooden (and freakishly bleach blonde) Van Damme (who has since gone on to get his mojo back - his last few straight to video films have been pretty good!) undoes any good he's able to bring to the picture. While Van Damme isn't entirely responsible for the picture's quality, when your leading man has the charisma of a rock and is about as charismatic as a corpse, you're in trouble. If the rest of the cast members were memorable or stood out in any way aside from their costumes and special moves we could maybe get past this, but that doesn't happen.

    The main problem with the picture is that it's really inconsistent. We get a few scenes that attempt to play things straight and then move on into the utterly ridiculous action and fight scenes. Had the picture been able to play things completely straight, it might have worked, and on the flip side of that coin had it gone completely over the top it could have wound up being a lot of fun but instead it bounces back and forth and never finds its stride.

    That said, as bad as this movie is, it's not impossible to enjoy it on a very base level. If you want a predictable and by the numbers action/adventure film that will entertain the twelve year old boy trapped deep inside of you, this'll do the trick. If you think about it too much you'll probably give yourself an aneurysm but IF you can turn off your brain and IF you can get past the ridiculousness of it all and IF you don't get too hung up on the differences between the game and the movie (and there are lot of them) then as a big budget B-movie you can do worse. Not much worse, mind you, but if you really try you can do it.

    Video/Audio/Extras:

    The 1080p 2.35.1 anamorphic widescreen transfer on this new Blu-ray release is quite strong, even if it's a bit on the soft side at times. Color reproduction is good even if it never really pops like you might want it to. Black levels are strong but not as inky as a newer movie might look, while skin tones look quite good and very natural. Detail isn't super strong but things definitely could have looked a lot worse. There aren't any problems to report with mpeg compression artifacts or heavy edge enhancement, nor is there much in the way of heavy grain or print damage to complain about. All in all, the movie looks pretty good. Not perfect, but pretty good and when you compare it to the SD release you really notice the increased detail and stronger color reproduction which does help things a bit, in terms of appreciating the set design and what not.

    Take your pick of the original English language track presented in a very strong DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio mix or one of the two Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround Sound options available dubbed into French or Spanish with optional subtitles provided English SDH, French and Spanish. Surround usage is good throughout the film, particularly during the more action intensive moments. Bass response is decent, though it definitely could have been stronger, and levels are well balanced throughout. There aren't any problems with hiss or distortion and dialogue remains quite clear throughout the movie. This is a fairly active and aggressive track that makes good use of all channels.

    The extras on this release kick off with a feature length commentary track from the film's director, Steven de Souza. While there are a few too many long gaps of silence, de Souza actually delivers a fairly interesting discussion on the film and he plays it all with complete seriousness. He talks about working with Van Damme, coordinating some of the stunt work, shooting on various sets and about some of the difficulties that you face when adapting a video game into a movie. He also talks about his feelings on the effects of violent video games and movies and about shooting overseas. It's considerably more interesting than you'd probably expect it to be, even if it is periodically quiet and generally humorless.

    From there, check out the making of featurette, which looks like it was created to promote the film during its original theatrical release. Aside from some typical behind the scenes clips, there are cast and crew interviews here that allow the participants to talk about their characters and their work on the picture. This doesn't get too deep, however, it's really little more than a simple PR piece.

    Universal has also dug up a fairly extensive collection of storyboards used for the film and presented them in still gallery format. It would have been nice to have a commentary over top of this to top it all into context, but sadly they're presented silently. Three minutes of Outtakes are more interesting in that they give us a look at the cast and crew on set while the Cyberwalk section is a fun, if text heavy, section that plays out as propaganda hoping to rally up the troops to fight alongside Bison in his army. In the context of the film, this is fairly amusing and fun to sift through.

    The archives section contains a still gallery of publicity photos, a gallery of artwork, some quick on set interviews, and an interesting section detailing movie spin-off's like cards and action figures. Rounding out the extra features are trailers for the Street Fighter IV game, the Street Fighter IV anime movie, clips from the Street Fighter II and Street Fighter: The Movie video games, two brief deleted scenes, some fun animated menus and chapter selection. Like most Universal Blu-ray releases, Street Fighter is Blu-ray Live enabled so you can go online and interact with other fans and access exclusive content.

    The Final Word:

    Universal tries to polish a turd, and partially succeeds. Is Street Fighter a bad film? There's really no denying it. With that said, it's fun in a bad movie sort of way and the strong A/V presentation and wealth of extra features go a fairly long way towards making this package worthy. Die-hard fans of the movie (and they are out there) can definitely add this to their lists, everyone else should rent it first, because really, it takes a certain kind of bad movie fan to get into this one…
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