These days, film adaptations of games can be a risky undertaking, but in 1995 such attempts were considered completely hopeless. "Super Mario Brothers" (1993) and "Double Dragon" (1994) have already succeeded fail miserably, without receiving flattering reviews from either critics or fans. "Street Fighter" (1994) became more financially successful, but was still too far from achieving cult status.
So it was like a bolt from the blue when, 20 years ago, on August 18, 1995, "Mortal Kombat" reached number one in cinemas. The film grossed $122 million worldwide and broke the curse of video games by becoming the first film adaptation to win over fans..
Mortal Kombat survived expensive extra filming, broken ribs and screaming executives during his journey from arcades to the big screen. This journey began when the producer Larry Kasanoff visited several friends on Midway games in June 1993. He previously worked with James Cameron, turning "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" (1991) into a successful brand worth millions. One of his latest achievements was the arcade game T2, a linear shooter that broke records Midway.
The guys from Midway showed Kasanoff "Mortal Kombat", a new game that they say will break T2's record. It was something bloody, hyper-realistic and had already become a sensation in the world of arcade games. But Kasanoff believed that MK destined to become more than just a video game. He considered the game a T2 phenomenon. He's already seen television series, stage shows, albums and films in the foreseeable future. Midway were skeptical.
"YOU ARE CRAZY! IT'S JUST A GAME!
In June 1993, Larry Kasanoff meets with friends in Midway gameswho are praising their new sensation, Mortal Kombat. Its continuation Mortal Kombat 2, was in testing, and Kasanoff was stunned by the first look at the series, which had not yet made it to home video game consoles.
Larry Kasanoff, producer:
I sat in their office and played Mortal Kombat for about half an hour. Then I turned to Neil D. Nicastro [former director of Midway Games] and said, “This is just like a cross between Star Wars and Enter the Dragon.” This is not just an arcade game. This is a real phenomenon." I said: “If you give me the rights to it, I promise you that I will personally handle the production, the film is just a small thing, I will make MK a global brand.” He looked at me and said: “You're crazy! It's just a game!" Then began a three-month process of trying to convince them that this was more than just a game. But they didn't believe. Nobody believed in this idea, because shortly before this, all these film adaptations of games like "Mario Brothers" failed at the box office. But I still convinced them, and they gave me the rights for an insanely short period of time. Now I would never get involved in such an adventure, but this was the first deal for my company.
Ed Boon, creator of the game “Mortal Kombat”:
When the film was still being discussed, I remember not taking it seriously at first. It seemed to me that things would not move beyond conversations. And then all of a sudden we started getting phone calls about casting, and they kept asking, “What about that guy for this character? What about this guy for that character?” I remember them asking, "What do you think about Danny Glover as Raiden?
Kasanoff:
Everyone told me it wouldn't work, that it would be the end of my career. Including New line cinema. They've already greenlit the movie, and the head of the studio comes in with the script, throws it on the table and says, "I hate the script, I hate this movie." He yelled at us for another hour, and then said: “To hell with you. Take it off already, now that you’ve decided.”
Laurie Apelian, co-producer:
We received materials from very, very famous directors. Directors with entire lists of important, wonderful films. But I wanted to find someone who had a fresh, innovative approach. I went to the viewing room to see "Shopping". Paul Anderson was an unknown director with this little film. I didn't know anything about him. And I was simply amazed by his talent. Jude Law, Shawn Bin. They filmed it for about $100 on the streets of London. After watching the film, I immediately said: “We have to take this guy.” There was nothing to think about here.
Paul W.S. Anderson, director:
I grew up in the northern industrial town of Newcastle, where there was no film industry. I came to London for meetings, trying to somehow get my career off the ground. Quite often, meetings fell at 10 o'clock in the morning or 3 o'clock in the afternoon. I didn't know anyone in London, so all I could do was play video games in the arcade for three, four hours. One of my favorite games was Mortal Kombat. And then I find out that they are going to make a film based on this game. Most filmmakers were a little mediocre about it. I was full of enthusiasm.
Apelian:
Paul came in every day with amazing, creative ideas on how to shoot something better or how to create some fantastic scene. Due to the limited budget, we could not fully implement all his ideas, but suddenly it gave birth to new ideas.
Anderson:
I had no experience with visual effects, so I went to Samuel French's bookstore and bought every visual effects book I could find. About drawing on a hard surface, about CGI. I even developed my own slang. It sounded like I knew more about computer graphics than anyone else in Hollywood, even though it was all new to me. Of course, I embellished a lot, but I think they were impressed by my enthusiasm.
KOMBAT TEAM
Anderson joined the team during pre-production in early 1994, but Kevin Drowney's script was still being finalized. Hong Kong martial arts veteran Robin Shu, turns out to be the best candidate for the role of Liu Kang, but the “recruitment” process itself turns into real torture.
Robin Shu, Liu Kang:
This was my most difficult casting. I was working in Hong Kong at the time, but I flew to the US periodically because I lived here. And on one of these visits, my friend from the agency tells me that a casting is being held for the film “Mortal Kombat”. At first I laughed because I thought Mortal Kombat was a dumb name. "Mortal Kombat"? A movie based on a video game? But my friend continued to follow me around and kept saying: “You simply have to try. Go to the casting." In the end, I auditioned for the role seven times. My agent friend had never heard of anyone else having to audition for a role seven times before. I had to interview with the producers, with the director, with the production director, then with the casting producer, and finally my last meeting was with New Line Cinema. It was very important for them to cast an Asian because this character, Liu Kang, is of Asian descent and they invested millions into this project. It was real torture.
Anderson:
The script wasn't completely written when we were in pre-production, which was a challenge, but that was a good thing because it gave me the opportunity to improvise. When it came to actually shooting the film, I strongly encouraged the actors to bring something of their own to the film. There is a lot of humor in the film. There is a lot of good humor in it, especially from Lindena Ashby (Johnny Cage) and Christopher Lambert [Raiden].
Linden Ashby, Johnny Cage:
That's how we came up with the line, "Those were $500 glasses, idiot," and that stupid moment in the movie where I walk in at the very beginning and say, "Shall we dance?"
Boone:
John Tobias [Mortal Kombat creator and Boone's companion] and I wrote comments on the script because I remember we thought it was too comical at first. Raiden was always cracking jokes like some kind of comedian, and I remember saying, “He’s a serious character, not a clown.” We weren't involved in writing the script, but we read it and then sent them our comments.
Ashby:
The script still needed some work. So we sat down and reworked the script to the point where the writer kind of disliked us, I think. I remember later meeting screenwriter Kevin Drowney at a Christmas party after the film came out. He introduced me to his companion and said: “This is the guy I told you about. This is an asshole who ruined my script." (laughs) And I was like, “Oh, hi.” This was not a script made on our knees, we worked on it a lot. We didn't write Hamlet or anything, but it was a lot of fun.
Apelian:
We needed to make a film that was rated PG-13. It was hard because the game itself is very brutal. We began to study the ratings system in detail to find out how many obscene words are permissible to use, how much blood is permissible to show. So we found out that if a person is killed on screen, the film is automatically rated R. So we had to play it all out in such a way that any death shown on screen would not be human. If you watch our film, you'll see that only Goro is killed on screen, which allowed us to get around all the rough edges and get a PG-13 rating.
Kasanoff:
I never thought of it as if we were making a movie based on a video game. I've always imagined a video game as the first incarnation of a story. The game is just the tip of the iceberg. I always imagined that there was a certain story and the first embodiment of this story was a video game. Well, now let's explore this story in more detail and see how we can make a movie out of it. So the film does not contradict the video game, but rather serves as a complement to it.
Apelian:
Initially we considered Cameron Diaz as a candidate for the role of Sonya Blade. We were at New Line Cinema when the film "Mask" was in post-production. At that time, the name Cameron Diaz was not yet on everyone’s lips. Nobody knew her. And so they say: “We have a young, unknown actress in mind here. Maybe you should watch some footage of her. What do you say? And as soon as we saw the footage from The Mask, we had no doubt that she was a star. We forced her to undergo training because she had no experience in martial arts. But she broke her wrist right before filming began and was no longer able to participate in the action scenes. So we were very happy to find Bridget [Wilson-Sampras]. It's great that she was free.
Bridget Wilson-Sampras, Sonya Blade:
The casting process was very long. I came back and auditioned again and met them so many times. Probably seven times. And I kept coming back and coming back... meeting with Paul, with Larry, with the producers. Then I got a role in the film "Billy Madison". So, I started filming Billy Madison and I thought, “Oh my God, I'm not getting this part,” because they still couldn't make a decision. Then, on the last day of filming Billy Madison, they call me and ask, “So, do you agree? Provided that we fly out tomorrow morning?” and I was like, “Yes!” I was so happy that I was able to “kill two birds with one stone.”
Apelian:
We also thought of inviting Sean Connery for the role of Raiden. However, we understood that at that time he needed rest. At the time, he was not interested in doing action films. For the role of Johnny Cage, we needed an actor who could look bold, as his character demanded, but at the same time be humane. Linden had the right combination of both. A daring actor, but at the same time not devoid of humanity and warmth. With Talisa [Soto, Kitana] and Bridget, we had two well-written characters. I didn't want women to be cardboard characters. They were expected to have strength, independence and intelligence that went beyond their beauty and sexuality. They were very smart, strong women.
Christopher Lambert, Raiden:
I had lunch with Paul Anderson and Larry Kasanoff and they offered me the role. They gave me the script and I thought it was funny. I watched Paul's first film before agreeing. I really liked it. Well, then a hat, a robe, white hair appeared - all this helped to create the image. In the film, due to Raiden's supernatural strength, he does not need to train. Amazing. This was the only action movie for which it was not necessary to undergo special training.
Anderson:
When you make your first Hollywood film as a young director, there is a great danger that you will be overwhelmed by its scale. So having an experienced person on set, a well-known, highly paid actor like Christopher, helps a lot. He behaved calmly and at ease; for him it was not a big deal. Such a person sets the general tone on the set. And you understand that if this is not a problem for him, then it should not be a problem for everyone else.
Boone:
Christopher Lambert did a great job. He brought a lot of his own personal touches to the role. We didn’t think so globally back then. We looked at Raiden as a character from Asian mythology. We've never shown his face that clearly in the game, and we've never made him a specific race, but we certainly didn't think of him as "Gorce". This was never in our minds.
Anderson:
We made a creative deal with Christopher because he only worked for four or five weeks for a certain amount. His fee was hefty and he couldn't afford to go to Thailand because it would be beyond what we paid him. So I came up with a plan where we were going to shoot close-ups of Chris in Los Angeles, then shoot long shots with his stunt double in Thailand, and then stitch those shots together in a smart way. Christopher listened to my idea and then said, “Forget it. I'm flying to Thailand." It seemed to him that if he could directly be there, among these landscapes, it would make the film better. That's how it all turned out. I'm sure his agents, manager and lawyer were furious because he essentially went to Thailand for free. When he arrived, he paid for everything out of his own pocket.
BEGAN
The team gathers for the first part of filming in Los Angeles before heading to Thailand for a month, where many of the film's memorable scenes will be filmed.
Ashby:
We went to the Santa Monica airport and we filmed a lot there. Fortunately, there was room to turn around. There was a fenced area on the south side of the field, and we went there on Friday when we were packing our luggage. Oh my God. What was going on there was simply hilarious! We had a doctor, such a funny guy. Smart guy. He was responsible for security on the set. He should have gone into security, not worked as a medic. And Tom Cruise there was a hangar nearby, and that means he comes up and says: “Hey, guys, what are you filming here? May I take a look at it?" And the doctor told him: “You are not acting in a film. Go away! Tom Cruise was like, “I just want to watch,” and he said, “I don’t care who you are, get out of here!” Can you imagine!? He sent Tom Cruise away!
Anderson:
Goro was created by Tom Woodruff and Alec Gillies of Amalgamated Dynamics. Tom is the same guy in the Alien costume in the movie “Alien 3”. Goro was massive in size, so powering it required a lot of computers and people to operate it. It often broke down and we had to wait forever for it to be fixed. Goro became our capricious Diva. Everyone made fun of him and said, “Goro doesn’t want to leave his trailer.” We blocked it and I tried to shoot it as creatively as possible so that I wouldn't have to go through the hassle of handling such a huge thing. We did some CG magic to improve his lip syncing and a few other things. There was even a crew meeting where we discussed taking Goro to Thailand, and I immediately said, “That will never happen. He can barely breathe in the studio in Burbank, and I can’t even imagine what will happen to him in Thailand.”
Jonathan A. Carlson, director:
This guy had 13 or 16 puppeteers. Cables were everywhere. One person controlled the eyeballs, another made his eyebrows move, a third controlled something else. They spent one million dollars on this doll. When we designed the statue gardens, we also wanted to put in beautiful ponds with large floating lilies, but at the last moment they were afraid that Goro might fall into one of my ponds and then short circuit and damage all the electronics. Instead it was said, “Let's screw up Jonathan's design and have no ponds,” so we took all the water out.
Anderson:
The first fight scene I shot was Robin Shue. Just imagine: here is Robin - a man who has starred in a lot of films in Hong Kong... and I am a complete ignoramus in this matter. We start filming this big, long fight, and we film it in one take, in a long shot. Then I notice that something is going wrong, and I start over. Then a few more errors appear, and I start all over again. Naturally, the guys are already starting to get tired, because they are giving it their all. Finally, Robin comes up to me and asks, “Paul, you know what spatial coverage is, right?” And I was like, “Oh yeah! Sorry". The fact is that when filming battle scenes, the long shot is used only for a couple of seconds and that’s it. You always film the fight itself in a tighter radius to show the blows from the right angles. I learned a lot while making this film, and I was very lucky to work with people who were understanding and didn't try to strangle me when I forced them to continuously practice action scenes in wide shots.
Shu:
When Pat [E. Johnson] staged the fights, he had to adapt them as much as possible to my style. I had a lot of ideas in my head, borrowed from Hong Kong cinema. They're a little stylized, but these are action, martial arts, kung fu films, so it's okay, that's how it should be. So he gave me the freedom to do whatever I wanted. The way we worked was he gives me the script and does the first combination of punches, and then I either complete it or just move on to the next combination based on how I think the rhythm of the fight should flow. Then he proposes. “Maybe we should try something different here? Whatever is best for the story." In fact, the fight scenes also have a plot. He gave me this direction, and I simply changed the course of the fight in accordance with his comments. In general, choreography is similar to dance. The whole point is how to move from point A to point B and from point B to point C, in order to end the battle at point C. You develop combinations that take you smoothly from one point to another, and then complete that combination at the end. I was able to bring a lot of my own ideas into the action scenes of the film.
Anderson:
Flying to Thailand was a big decision because I wanted real, big landscapes. When we went exploring, we found places and beaches that I really liked, but there were also some that were not so easy to get to. Every morning we had to transport all the equipment by boat. It was great because I worked on the boat every day. It didn't matter how tired you were last night. By the time you got to work, crossing the bay at 60 mph with the wind blowing through your hair, it was fantastic. You felt truly inspired.
Carlson:
The Thais have a completely different mentality when it comes to construction and scenery. I tell them: “Guys, do you see these boulders? We need to get them over there." Then about a hundred guys will come running, they will stand, smoke, walk around the boulder, then argue about how best to drag it, then drag it. Then they will stop, smoke again, then again they will yell and argue about where to take him. Finally, you come back at the end of the day and the boulder will be on the other side. Then I offer them a simpler option: take an excavator and move everything in five minutes. And they told me: “No, no, no. We work our own way." Then we found a local guy who owned a lot of heavy equipment. We hired him, he came, kicked everyone, yelled at them well. That's all. From that day on, everything went like clockwork. But the first month without him was just some kind of nightmare. Nothing was done. The pressure was mounting. In general, he came, gave them a slap, and after that everyone began to work quickly.
Ashby:
There were guys in Thailand who went up the river for a long time. It was so hot. You're filming in the tropics, you've drunk a lot of alcohol - you stand there, people are sweating, and they reek of fumes, like from a distillery. You're standing next to someone and suddenly they just fall into the dirt. All. He's passed out. At that moment, everyone was hurting so much. You just look at the guy lying next to you and hear: “And, it’s taken.” Nobody even paid attention to it.
Wilson-Sampras:
I was the quiet one who finished work and went to my room. And this happened day after day - so sad. I remember how much fun they had there. I had a blast too, only in a different way. My mother went with me. I don’t remember how old I was then... 21 or still 20? We went everywhere and had a blast. It was the most beautiful place you can see.
Carlson:
We found a new use for foam when working on film sets. This is a yellow foam that expands 28, 30 times its own weight. Amazing stuff. It is a derivative of white polystyrene foam that can become hard like a rock or soft like a marshmallow, or it can be used like playdough in a specific consistency. Before you knew it, we created our world with this foam. For example, we take hemp rope, spray this foam, then it foams up and it becomes a big vine. Or we spray it on the plastic, then break it, bend the corners, and it turns into giant leaves. We had whole teams of people working for us, traveling all over Bangkok, because it was difficult to find polystyrene foam in Thailand back then. These guys stormed all the markets and specialty stores, buying polystyrene foam wherever they could.
Wilson-Sampras:
I did all my stunts and fight scenes myself, it was amazing. I didn't have to prepare as much as the rest of the guys, who worked with coaches for several weeks before filming began. Luckily, they put my fight scene with Kano [Trevor Goddard] at the very end while we were already filming in Thailand, so I trained alongside filming, during lunch or in my free time. At the very beginning, I dislocated my shoulder. I had a partial displacement of my shoulder joint, but it was strange because I was completely fine. They were worried and made me take these tests. They tell me, “You must have a problem with your shoulder, but it doesn’t seem to bother you since you don’t tell us anything. Do you have a magic shoulder? And I say, “I swear I don’t know. I do not know what happened". Anyway, they set my shoulder and we continued filming. Everything was OK.
Kasanoff:
Some fights took two weeks to film. Everything in the film is real. If you see a guy jump on someone's shoulders and then snap his opponent's neck, that's what he's doing. We scoured the world to find these unique martial artists, brought them all together, and created fight scenes that reflected their skills. That is, if one guy had a certain skill, we would stage a fight scene for him, which allowed him to demonstrate his skill in all its glory.
Boone:
At that time, the production process was new to me. Seeing all these people in suits and hearing them say, “The guy who plays Shang Tsung is coming tomorrow. Next week we're filming Sub-Zero's fight with Liu Kang." You could see with your own eyes how it was all planned. Everything was absolutely realistic, with a budget. It was very exciting for twenty-year-old kids just to be there and see their game gradually turn into a film.
"I URINED BLOOD"
After filming wraps in Thailand, test audiences tell the team that the film is great, but there is one major problem.
Ashby:
We shut down production, then we collected all the scenes we had shot, and they suddenly realized that there weren't enough epic, memorable fights.
Kasanoff:
When we tested the first version of the film, the audience reaction was 100% unanimous. They all unanimously said: “We really liked everything we saw, but there weren’t enough fights in the film.” So we went back and spent even more money to film more fight scenes.
Anderson:
We've added my favorite fights. Scorpio's fight with Johnny Cage and Reptile's fight with Liu Kang. We had a very good stunt coordinator, but as the film went on, I wanted to experiment more and more with cables to bring a Hong Kong action feel to the film. And Robin did a great job with this task, he choreographed the additional fight scenes himself. Robin is an actor, but he started out as a stuntman in Hong Kong. They With Jackie Chan worked, so he knew a lot about it. If you watch Mortal Kombat now, you'll notice that it was the first time all those Chinese cable gags were used in a Western film. Of course, in "The Matrix"A few years later, all this was done on a completely different level. But at that time, Mortal Kombat was revolutionary in this regard.
Shu:
Even though this is a movie and you want to look believable, you still have to remember that this is a movie based on a video game and it needs to be stylized. The movement must not stop. Characters should not take a break, because if Scorpio wants to kill someone, he will relentlessly go after his opponent. Same thing with Reptile. There should be no pauses. There is no such thing that I knock the enemy down, take a breath, then he gets up, and we fight again. That would be boring!
Anderson:
Robin scored the fights as one, two or three points. This meant how many ribs he had damaged during a particular fight. For example, the fight with Reptile was worth three points, so he really felt like he gave it his all for me. I also remember Linden Ashby swallowing painkillers like M&M's. We beat the crap out of him during that fight. I remember very well the moment how he barely trudges from the set and complains: “I have never experienced such pain in my life.” And I ask him: “Well? How many ribs did you break? Robin broke three!
Shu:
The hardest thing about Johnny and Scorpio's fight was convincing Linden that he could do anything. He's an actor. At first he refused, saying: “Give me an understudy!”, but I told him: “Linden, you can do everything perfectly yourself. The more you do, the more realistic and believable the scene looks.” And he bought it. “Yes, they beat you up. You get bruises, but you look fantastic at the end.”
Ashby:
I fought Chris Casamassa [Scorpio], who, funny enough, was my teacher. In this fight, Chris kicked me in the kidneys with all his might. I was wearing special protective pads, but his heel went right between those pads. After this delicious blow I was urinating blood. Damn, that hurt!
Shu:
My fight with Reptile was intended to be more dynamic. I did everything in that scene. There's a moment where Reptile throws me and I hit a pillar, and while doing this stunt, I broke two ribs because I didn't expect to hit the edge of the column. Besides, this was my tenth take, so I was a little tired. But I didn't tell anyone anything. What's the point? If I told them that I broke my ribs, they would stop filming and then that would be it, goodbye to my Hollywood dream. The pain was just hellish. I took a lot of painkillers and then continued the rest of the fight with two broken ribs. I said to Keith Cook, who played Reptile, “I feel pain in my right side, try not to hit me there.” In general, I gritted my teeth, endured this battle, and then immediately went to the hospital.
“WE GOT KICKED FROM TWO RECORD COMPANIES”
The Mortal Kombat soundtrack turned out to be quite bold. It featured electronic dance music, which was highly unusual for a Hollywood film. This made securing a record deal an almost impossible task.
Kasanoff:
This soundtrack became the first ever platinum electronic dance music album. We insisted on using electronic dance music, which was considered utter madness at the time. We got the boot from two record companies. We wanted to make a deal with Sony for a lot of money. In those days, you could make a lot of money from soundtracks; that's no longer possible. We go to them and say: “Here’s our idea - electronic dance music.” And they told us: “No, here’s our idea. Buckethead! "This is the guy who played music with a bucket on his head. We thought, "Well, he's a good guitar player..." They wanted Buckethead to duel Eddie Van Halen or something. We continued to stick to our line: “Electronic dance music,” and they kicked us out. Then we approached Virgin Records. We come in and say, “We have a great idea. Electronic dance music." And they were like, “Yeah, what about Janet Jackson?” No, she, of course, is a wonderful singer, but we were immediately like: “What? Janet Jackson in Mortal Kombat? In short, we were thrown out again. In the end, we never made a deal. Fortunately, the studio made concessions, giving us complete creative freedom. We made the MK soundtrack and pitched it to a little record company that no one had ever heard of and ended up getting the first platinum EDM soundtrack.
George S. Clinton, composer:
For their first test listen, they showed a temporary piece of music that consisted mostly of traditional orchestral battle music, and it soon became apparent that the target audience, who were used to hearing techno while playing the game, would not be happy with this approach. So this gave me the opportunity to realize my idea, which I called: “Techno-Taiko-Orko”. The basis of my musical sketch was techno with an overlay of Asian ethnic instruments (taiko drums, shakuhachi, Tuvan throat singer), and all this accompanied by an orchestra. But not an ordinary orchestra, but a “testosterone” orchestra. No treble clef instruments (no flutes, clarinets, trumpets, violins, etc.). There are 18 violas, 14 cellos, six basses, lots of brass and percussion. This created a massive sound. When music directors John Julian and Sharon Boyle introduced me to guitarist Buckethead, I knew he would be a key element in my lineup.
Kasanoff:
My partner is Jimmy Inner, who is, among other things, one of the greatest music producers in history. What an action movie should have, in his opinion, is a catchy rhythm. There must be a dance rhythm. There needs to be a rhythm that keeps the audience moving during the fight rather than just watching it from afar. You must captivate the audience. And since this is “Mortal Kombat,” something sharp, groovy, and driving is needed here. That's why we settled on this kind of music. We just bent over backwards trying to find the people we needed. We looked into all the clubs, found people, received materials. We have found the best musicians in our area. We searched and searched. They tried and tried and tried. It was an endless process. Music in a film is there to serve the film. Serve individual scenes. If you watch one of these fights without music, and then with music, within 30 seconds you'll be jumping out of your seat like crazy. There is no magic, we just knew it would be right.
Clinton:
The tracks they chose for the film were simply killer. Including the classic song “Immortals”, so another challenge for me was to ensure that my sketch did not get lost in the general background.
“I HAD A WILD JAMDRAGE”
The film goes into post-production and the team is awaiting its release date of August 18, 1995. The result will surprise everyone, as the film will remain in first place for three weeks in a row.
Lambert:
When Mortal Kombat was still in production, the industry was very doubtful about the film's success. “We have no idea if this will work,” they said.
Anderson:
I had wild jitters before the premiere. So many thoughts swarmed in my head! Will the film work? Or will it be a complete failure? Will I be able to maintain my career? Or will I be kicked out of America? I thought then: “Lord, Los Angeles is the last place on Earth where I want to be right now. I just want to hide somewhere." I went to Hawaii with my then-girlfriend just to get rid of that pressure, and of course we ended up in the middle of nowhere. And then I read in the newspaper that the film took first place. And I was like, “Damn, why aren’t we in Los Angeles? My movie is in first place, and I'm stuck here! I should be in Los Angeles and basking in the glory." But I had already paid for the trip to Hawaii, so we had to stay there.
Boone:
I remember waking up on Sunday morning and turning on CNN and hearing, “Mortal Kombat made $23,3 million,” which was the second-biggest August opening in history, which was just incredible. We tore everyone apart!
Apelian:
None of us doubted the success of the film. But we were surprised that it stayed in first place for three weeks. I don't think we expected this.
Kasanoff:
I promised Midway CEO Neil D. Nicastro that I would make MK a global brand. And I kept my promise. Then off we went: TV series, theatrical shows. It got to the point that on the day the film premiered, I boarded a plane to the Catskills to begin rehearsals for the show at Radio City Music Hall. Subsequently, all this resulted in several years of my endless rushing from one MK project to another.
Anderson:
After Mortal Kombat, I wanted to try my hand at something different. I remember as the head of the New Line Cinema studio, Mike De Luca asked me if I wanted to come back and make a second film "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation". But in the end I took on another project. My next film was "Through the Horizon", a very dark film, the exact opposite of Mortal Kombat. After the success with MK, I spread my wings. Now, looking back, I think: “Oh, maybe it was worth doing this after all.” Only later, years later, when I started filming "Resident Evil", I said to myself: “Since I have the chance to film another game, now I’ll see it through to the end. I will forever remain with the franchise and will shepherd it.” Ironically, my refusal to work on the second “Mortal Kombat” became the reason that I still can’t part with “Resident Evil”, filming more and more parts.
Official source: www.hollywoodreporter.com
Published: August 18 2015
Translation: Black Dragon
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Tags: Mortal Kombat, Bridget Wilson, Chris Casamassa, Christopher Lambert, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Lindan Ashby, Paul U. S. Anderson, Robin Shu, filming, Talisa Soto, Trevor Goddard
Tags: Mortal Kombat, Bridget Wilson, Chris Casamassa, Christopher Lambert, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Lindan Ashby, Paul U. S. Anderson, Robin Shu, filming, Talisa Soto, Trevor Goddard
Thank. Very interesting!
Thank you very much. Very interesting, although, to be honest, I don’t understand the success and cult status of this film, although I recognize and share them. Objectively speaking, it’s a conventional plot, which since “Enter the Dragon” has been erased and simply turned into dust. Despite the huge number of athletic actors in the supporting roles, François Petit, Kate Cook, Casamassa, Hakeem Alston, the choreography, even by 1995 standards, is rather weak. Robin Shu had previously worked in Hong Kong in supporting roles and in films of a completely prohibitive category from the Phillip Ko studio. The film has a certain lightness and some captivating teenage humor, but the characters are as cardboard as the plot. Being a fan of the game, I physically cannot criticize its film adaptation, but the ways of God are inscrutable. This is, indeed, a cinematic event, a cult and a classic, but the more spectacular and technical “Tekken” or “Dead or Alive” failed and sunk into history.
Dmitriy,
It's not just about the fighting. Everything combined had an impact here: the plot, the music, and the atmosphere itself. And Robin Shu, I think, was simply perfect for the role of Liu Kang. Now it’s even difficult to imagine someone else in his place. Although during the final fight I periodically rooted for Tagawa. He very well embodied the image of Shang Tsung on the screen. At that time, the film seemed completely out of the ordinary to me. I really thought “MK” was the best film in the world. He was unusual in his own way, standing out noticeably among all the action films of that time. He occupied his own separate niche. By the way, I also like the second part, although it is noticeably weaker. Now it’s fashionable to scold her, but I don’t remember anyone complaining at that time. Both films and games, then it was all perceived as a single whole. I somehow didn’t notice the shortcomings before, and even now... or maybe I just don’t want to notice them. Watching such films years later, of course, many things may seem naive and a little feigned, so you need to be able to, at such moments, somehow return to childhood and “stifle” the inner critic within you. At least that's what I do. While I was translating, I watched the film (both parts). And I can say that for me he is still just as cool.
I suspect that a large part of the matter is that the Asian market was practically inaccessible to us at that time. It's now full of everything and anything, Japanese, Korean, Chinese classics from SB. That is, MK had few competitors. But in general, I completely agree that criticism in oneself must be suppressed.
Dmitriy,
That's it, but I can't call "Tekken" and "DOA" more spectacular and technical.
Well, why not? I really like the first Tekken. In my opinion, it very accurately conveys the spirit of the game. And in DOA Corey Yuen, which in itself is already a sign of quality.
Dmitriy,
"Tekken" is very intimate and cheap. And there is nothing left from the game except the characters. Only a couple of fights were technical, and even then, I can’t remember them anymore, unlike the same fights from MK. Well, I don’t even want to remember about DOA - women’s fights, senseless and merciless. Zero choreography. Even despite Corey Yuen. The only bright spot in the film is Kane Kosugi.
No problem. ) And thanks to the administration for the publication and design. At first I was looking for some interesting interview with Robin Shu, but in the end this bonus came up. As for MK, I agree completely. It's more than a movie. This is a Legend!
Black Dragon, thank you very much for the material on one of your favorite topics! ;)
This is very interesting material, thank you very much for the translation and publication.