Despite fairly accurately recreating the story-mode of the modern Mortal Kombat games, this latest attempt at a film adaption feels too much like a video game and only stays afloat by a couple of entertaining performances. On paper, the plot is pretty solid, and it continues on from the first film while essentially mashing together the plot of the first two Mortal Kombat games. Unfortunately, it has many of the same flaws as that first film including plenty of characters with little charisma. Most of these carry over from the previous film, but even some of the newer characters are pretty one-note. Thankfully, Karl Urban breathes life into the film with his cantankerous take on Johnny Cage. (There are also quite a few laughs provided by the returning Josh Lawson as Kano.) This leads to another of the film’s big flaws: It starts off as Kitana’s story before pivoting to being about Cage, and then not really committing to either before trying to appease both. (And that’s also at the expense of Cole Young, who goes from lead of the first film to just a side character here.) In theory, this film features really cool fight scenes, but in reality, they mostly fall flat. There’s an extensive use of CG, not just in all the special moves, but also the blood and guts. Even many of the locations look unrealistic. In general, the film struggles between serious and campy, and every time it looks to nail dramatic moment or a cool fatality, the cheesiness shines through and knocks it down a peg. On top of all of that, like the games it’s based on, death tends to have little meaning so anytime someone is killed you can’t help but think that they’ll be back.
** out of *****