Directed by Andrzej Bartkowiak
Written by Justin Marks
Starring Kristin Kreuk, Chris Klein, Neil McDonough, Robin Shou, Michael Clark Duncan
Release Date February 27th, 2009.
Published February 28th, 2009.
Well, we’ve all seen career meltdowns off screen but how about witnessing a meltdown on screen? Chris Klein, best known for American Pie and Election does just that in Street Fighter Legend of Chun Li. As an Interpol agent, Klein delivers a performance of such goofball determination that his mere presence invites a giggle fit.
Klein combines vocal affectation and exaggerated gesture to evoke something akin to a soap opera actor crossed with a community theater wannabe on top of the jocky persona that has been his calling card in his biggest role. You’ll recall he played the meathead jock with a big heart in election and the meathead jock who goes soft in American Pie.
In Street Fighter he’s still a meathead but now a meathead with dramatic flair and an action heroes' sense of flair. Were there still a Mystery Science Theater this performance could go down in history as one of the great unintentionally hilarious roles in movie history.
As for the rest of Street Fighter, villain Neal McDonough, one of those character actors whose name escapes you but his face you’ve a few hundred times, earns a few of the same derisive laughs that Klein does. For McDonough it’s a bizarre accent, part Irish part Cantonese? Vietnamese? Something with an eastern flair that just doesn’t jive with the Irish brogue.
Michael Clarke Duncan is a long way away from the days when he was Oscar nominated for The Green Mile. He has become the go to beefy guy for beating people up. I can’t really say if there was another way for his career to play out but being an on-screen thug, the rest of his life doesn’t seem like the ideal career unless getting paid is your only motivation. I hope it was a really, really good paycheck.
And finally star Kristen Kreuk. I am not a regular viewer of TV’s Smallville, but I’m told it’s a well-acted, complex superhero story and Kreuk’s Lana Lang is integral to the plot. She’s been in every episode. She likely wishes she had stayed in Smallville. Street Fighter may have given her; her very first leading role but the movie makes her look like a 12-year-old girl on steroids. The hair and makeup choices really truly make her look far younger than her 26 years. She makes Dakota Fanning look like Liz Taylor.
That’s not a complement. The character is supposed to be in her mid-twenties. The look is distracting and unfortunate.
As for the plot, hey, if director Andrzej Bartkowiak doesn’t care about the plot, why should we? Check out that final act and tell me what the bad guy's motive is? It’s a futile search because the script doesn’t supply one. It’s not really needed because the final act is really about fight choreography and some of the dopiest looking low budget effects this side of 1984’s The Last Dragon. At least that movie had a cool soundtrack.
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