It's taken 30 years, but Nintendo finally has a Super Mario Bros. movie to please the masses. As a life-long Nintendo fan, I still can't quite believe it exists - even seeing photos of Shigeru Miyamoto rubbing shoulders with Chris Pratt on the Hollywood red carpet this week felt like a bizarre collision of galaxies - and yet in this age of Sonic the Hedgehog film sequels and Mushroom Kingdom theme parks, it's simultaneously odd it has taken this long. Here we are then, with 90 minutes of bright and breezy fare bringing Mario and the gang to the big screen in an adventure which is all-action and wafer-thin on plot - just like most Mario games! - albeit with a few tantalising hints at character development buried between the constant cameos and continual laughs.
Aside from those cameos, it's almost impossible to spoil the Super Mario Bros. Movie's story, such that it is. Mario is the everyman from New York, a do-good plumber with an extended pasta-eating Italian family and little brother Luigi who he's always looked out for. The film spends longer than expected setting up Mario's Brooklyn background (accompanied by a couple of nice voice cameos from original Mario voice actor Charles Martinet), though never dares sit still for too long. Amidst several plumbing and platforming action sequences, the movie finds time to smartly acknowledge Mario's new Chris Pratt accent (which quickly settles on the ear) and hand-wave the practicalities of a plumber in pristine white gloves. Quickly, however, both brothers end up magically sucked into the Mushroom Kingdom, leaving them separated and placed on two very different paths.
The rest of the film plays out very much as you might expect, with the introduction of familiar faces like Princess Peach (a determined-sounding Anya Taylor-Joy), benevolent protector of the rather Minions-like Toads, here given enough agency to also be on her own quest: to save her realm from the invading Bowser. Joining them are Toad himself (an endearingly enthusiastic Keegan Michael-Key) and the swaggering Donkey Kong (literally just Seth Rogen). Luigi (Charlie Day) is left with a more minor role, though ultimately is given his moments to shine. The true star of the film though, by far, is the typically ebullient Jack Black as Bowser, who gets plenty of screen time as well as a family friendly Tenacious D-esque musical number, which perfectly encapsulates his comically menacing ambitions on power and expectations of Peach somehow becoming his bride.