TRUE BLOOD

Guts, grapples, and Goro – director Simon McQuoid hopes to bring a faithful vision of MORTAL KOMBAT to the silver screen.

- Robin Valentine

The relationship between film and games has always felt… frayed. There’s a sense that Hollywood doesn’t quite understand this medium of ours – and there are so many failed game-to-film adaptations in the rear view that it’s hard to take a new one seriously.

The new Mortal Kombat film, due in the spring this year, is… well, it’s not necessarily set to change that situation much. It’s not shaping up to be a movie with grand, serious ambitions, or Oscars twinkling in its eyes. But it does look like a film that actually understands its source material – not just in terms of story and characters, but in spirit.

“I said it to everyone who came on board ‘We are not changing the DNA [of Mortal Kombat],’” explains director Simon McQuoid. “And the DNA is built out of a few different, really key ingredients. There’s a brutality. There’s a sense of humour that runs through it. There’s a sort of epic world-building, a nobility and respect for its serious canon. And there’s a thread of silly.”

We see all of that in the first official trailer, a whirlwind of violence, dark humour, and cheesiness that does immediately feel like something out of the more recent games’ cinematic story modes. With its rapid-fire character reveals and fan-pleasing moments – including Liu Kang performing his memorable (and ridiculous) fire dragon summoning move – it feels like a statement of intent as much as a taste of things to come. Particularly so in its deployment of blood and gore.