With “Mortal Kombat” already rebooted for the big screen, I guess it’s no surprise that its long-time fighting game rival “Street Fighter” would try and do the same thing. Both wildly popular video game franchises already had movie adaptations in the mid 1990s. Now they’re both back at it with mixed results at best. “Mortal Kombat” started decent with its 2021 reboot but fell off dramatically with its 2026 sequel. “Street Fighter” gets off to a much shakier start.

Directed by Kitao Sakurai, “Street Fighter” is the epitome of a mixed bag. And unfortunately in its case, the negatives too often overpower the positives. It’s a movie brimming with 1990’s energy, nostalgic callbacks, and enjoyable fan service for those of us who have had a part in the “Street Fighter” craze. But it’s also a loud, hollow, and borderline maddening mess of a movie that forgets some of the most basic tenets of filmmaking and storytelling.

In fairness to “Street Fighter”, no one should go into it expecting a high-minded and/or thought-provoking experience. From the very beginning, Sakurai is very honest about the kind of film he’s making. It embraces the absurdity to a near comical level. It also knows what die-hard fans are anticipating. They expect to see a ton of characters, over-the-top fighting sequences, and a ton of Easter eggs aimed squarely at them. To its credit, the movies delivers those things with varying degrees of success.

What it doesn’t deliver is anything resembling an entertaining story. For starters, it is ridiculously overstuffed yet somehow astonishingly shallow. A big reason is the clunky, chaotic plotting that begins with a crazy cartoonish charm only to lose it amid waves of unfunny humor, conflicting tones, incredibly dumb dialogue, and several generic backstories that don’t do their well-established characters any favors. Even a handful of stylish anime vignettes can’t liven up the story or make us care.

The setup goes something like this. In 1987, martial artist Ryu (Andrew Koji) wins the first ever World Warrior Tournament. In the process, a demon warrior named Akuma (Roman Reigns) is awakened. Ryu taps into a mysterious dark energy that enables him to fend off Akuma. But not before the demon kills Ryu’s mentor and teacher, Gouken. Their master’s death drives a wedge between Ryu and his childhood friend and training partner, Ken (Noah Centineo).

Six years pass. Ryu has disappeared off the grid while Ken has become a fame-obsessed entertainer driven by merch sales, endorsement deals, and deep resentment of Ryu. Elsewhere, a despot named M. Bison (David Dastmalchian) announces the second World Warrior tournament. Chun-Li (Callina Liang) goes out on Bison’s behalf to recruit the best fighters from around the world. Among them is Ken, who sees winning the tournament as a way to escape from his former best friend’s shadow.

But in reality, Bison is using the tournament as bait to lure out Ryu. His plan is to capture Ryu and siphon his fighting power for himself. At first Ryu resists. But after hearing Ken has entered and fearing the return of a vengeful Akuma, he re-emerges and enters the tourney himself in hopes of saving Ken’s life. Little does he know, he’s playing right into the comically nefarious Bison’s hands. Meanwhile Chun-Li is revealed to be an undercover Interpol agent with her own personal (and obvious) stakes in the tournament.

The movie spends a lot of time building up the eight-fighter tournament, with popular characters from the video games gathering from around the globe to compete. Yet the competition itself is wildly underwhelming, with several eliminations happening off screen and a couple of lame forfeits. We get more screeching from Eric André’s obnoxious MC than actual combat in the ring. And the characters are showcased more in a bar fight than in the actual tourney.

Yes, the tourney an ultimately a decoy for Bison, and that would be fine if the rest of the story packed a punch. Instead it clumsily bounces around from one point to the next, wedging in characters and doing nothing with them. It becomes a checklist movie that may tickle the fancies of fans in the moment, but that offers nothing for them to invest in. And it’s not helped by the film’s sham of an ending that’s more interested in setting up a second movie than finishing this one.

But despite all of those criticisms, “Street Fighter” has a certain self-awareness that gives it some appeal. The film is firmly-rooted in the 1990s as evident by its style, the nostalgia, and a plethora of cool needle-drops. Then you have the characters. While some woefully fall flat due to the writing (sorry Cody Rhodes and Jason Momoa), they all impress with their looks, fighting styles, and special moves which instantly hearkens back to their 2D roots. And some are just fun to watch. Vidyut Jammwal’s Dhalsim is a blast. And business certainly picks up once Reigns’ Akuma inevitably comes back around.

So again, “Street Fighter” is very much a mixed bag. It’s hard to call it a good movie when so much of the storytelling is wasted on nonsense and it constantly gets sidetracked checking boxes. At the same time, it’s full of over-the-top energy and satisfying callbacks that will have hardcore fans pointing at their screens with big smiles on their faces. Some cool visuals and a pulse-pounding electronic score from Leo Birenberg and Zach Robinson is icing on the cake. In the end, “Street Fighter” could have been something pretty amazing. But it’s hard to overcome a script this bad, even when you get so much else right.

VERDICT – 2.5 STARS

With 2010’s “The Social Network”, director David Fincher blew audiences away with his searing retelling of the founding of the social networking website Facebook. The movie was a critical and cultural smash hit, earning big money at the box office and winning numerous end-of-the-year accolades including three Academy Awards. One of those three Oscars went to Aaron Sorkin for his fast-paced, razor-sharp, semi-biographical screenplay.

Now sixteen years later we get “The Social Reckoning”, a standalone sequel that dramatizes the 2021 Facebook leak by whistleblowers Frances Haugen and Jeff Horwitz. Fincher passed on directing a sequel. And despite being offered a sizable check from the studio, Jesse Eisenberg also declined to return as billionaire Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg. That left Sorkin, who both writes and directs a film that desperately tries to capture the style and substance of “The Social Network”. It fails.

“The Social Reckoning” is a pale imitation of its vastly superior spiritual predecessor. Sorkin attempts to cover a lot of ground. But his blandly mechanical writing and direction dulls the story’s impact while leaving little room for emotional investment. Much of his script is fueled by a selective outrage and is too absorbed in its own sense of self-importance. At other times it is procedural to a fault, leaving it often feeling coldly systematic as it moves us from one point to the next. This even impacts the performances, but more on them in a second.

Frances Haugen is played by Mikey Madison who gives a dramatically different performance than her blaring Oscar-winning turn in “Anora”. Her Frances is a bit awkward and slightly neurotic. She’s also principled and driven, which are big reasons she went to work for Facebook as a data engineer. Frances was hired to the company’s Civic Integrity team where she hoped to address the alarming increase of harmful content and misinformation across the platform. But after she witnesses Facebook’s negligence firsthand, her mission shifts to exposing the company’s sins to the world.

Meanwhile investigative reporter Jeff Horwitz (Jeremy Allen White) is secretly working on a story for the Wall Street Journal that could blow the lid off of Facebook’s transgressions. But he needs evidence which the company does a good job hiding. Jeff’s investigation gets a boost after he is contacted by a frightened yet determined Frances. After several rinse-and-repeat scenes showing Frances’ hesitation, the two finally team up to bring the Facebook story to light.

As that’s going on, Sorkin repeatedly jumps forward one year to Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg (Jeremy Strong) preparing for his upcoming appearance before Congress. The scenes are a series of back-and-forths between Zuckerberg and his legal counsel and crisis management team. Though staged as the film’s most intense scenes, they’re arguably the most superfluous. They’re not helped by Strong’s hilariously stiff and robotic performance. I realize he and Sorkin are making a point. But Strong more closely resembles a Martian than a functioning CEO.

By the second half, the movie’s problems really start to mount. More and more moments feel like filler rather than something consequential. The awkward swings at humor feel wildly out of place. Underdeveloped characters pop in and out with little to no impact. Even Frances and Jeff struggle under Sorkin’s script. Both exist in their own bubbles and never come off as a cohesive pair. Then you have the eye-rolling all-caps ending that is a clunky mix of overwrought heavy-handedness and cheesy fist-pumping.

With “The Social Reckoning”, Sorkin tries to create something incisive and important. Instead he delivers a head-scratching misfire that doesn’t pack near the punch that it should. It’s a movie full of weird inventions, needless exaggerations, and a scattershot focus that undermines its weighty subject matter. Considering how well “The Social Network” has held up over the years, it’s a shame that its follow-up is neither timely or timeless.

VERDICT – 2 STARSHIP

Ken Carter was a Canadian stunt driver who earned his nickname “The Mad Canadian”. Born in Montreal and raised in a working class neighborhood, Carter would eventually drop out of school and hit the road with a team of travelling daredevils. He performed numerous car stunts with the group before taking off on his own as a solo act. He made a name for himself throughout the 1970s, performing jumps all across North America.

In 1976, Carter set out to best his American rival Evel Knievel by pulling off what would be advertised as “The Greatest Jump of All Time”. It was a one-mile jump across the Saint-Laurent River in a rocket-powered Lincoln Continental. Carter and his team’s preparation for the jump was the subject of a documentary called “The Devil at Your Heels” directed by Robert Fortier. The making of that documentary helped inspire the new film “The Stunt Driver”, a biographical comedy anchored by a Jay Baruchel performance that completely caught me by surprise.

Michael Dowse writes and directs this genuinely funny yet surprisingly heartwarming feature. It’s based on a true story yet is very upfront about fictionalizing certain characters, names, and incidents for dramatic effect, not unlike other movies inspired by actual events. Dowse offers up a thoughtful consideration of Ken Carter and the internal forces that drove him to put his life on the line. But he does so with a unique sense of humor which feels strangely organic to this somewhat bonkers story, and a compelling visual language. But more on it in a second.

Baruchel’s fascinating performance is the linchpin. He portrays Ken Carter through a striking combination of blaring bravado and quiet insecurity. When the cameras are rolling or a microphone is in front of him, Ken puts on a show full of brash self-promotion and overconfidence. But when left alone with his thoughts, his swagger vanishes and we see a man who is self-conscious, unfulfilled, and afraid. As anticipation and expectations mount, the two sides of Ken inevitably converge.

Much of the film chronicles the planning and preparation for Ken’s epic jump which will see him launching from Morrisburg, Ontario, across the Saint-Laurent River, and landing in New York state, assuming everything goes right. We see the troublesome construction of the 90-foot-high ramp. We meet the highly skeptical rocket scientist Dick Keller (Ed Helms) who is brought in to design Ken’s car. Evel Knievel (Ben Foster) pays a visit as a special correspondent for ABC who has agreed to air Ken’s jump on their television program “Wide World of Sports”. And it’s all being captured by documentarian Bob Fortier (Joe Cobden).

As deadlines are missed and numerous postponements push the jump back years, the relationships become as combustible as Ken’s souped up rocket car. The lone stabilizing force in his life is his wife Gloria (Laurence Leboeuf) who encourages him to walk away. But Ken’s urgency to prove himself to the world fuels his commitment. That inner conflict adds a psychological component to the story that Dowse commits to. Unfortunately Gloria herself isn’t given much to do despite feeling far more significant than her screen time might indicate.

Visually, “The Stunt Driver” is a dazzling mix of formats and ratios which instantly hearkens back to a 1970s period aesthetic. Additionally, Dowse and cinematographer Sara Mishara shrewdly blend original archival footage with newly filmed dramatizations. At times it conveys the feeling of watching a boxy 16mm documentary. Other times it resembles a textured and grainy 70s drama. It’s all accented by an authentic period production design and costumes which add to the immersion.

While “The Stunt Driver” only offers us a sliver of Ken Carter’s life, Dowse gives us a good sense of who he was and what pushed him to the extreme. The story gets a little wobbly in the last act as tensions boil over to ridiculous levels. But Dowse never loses track of the human pulse. And it’s that humanity, along with some well-modulated humor, that makes this underdog story both raucously entertaining and oddly inspirational.

VERDICT – 3.5 STARS

Japanese auteur Kiyoshi Kurosawa has carved a cinematic path that couldn’t be more different than that of the other esteemed filmmaker who shares his last name (no relation). Kurosawa cut his teeth on J-horror but quickly expanded his catalog to include dramas, black comedies, science-fiction, crime thrillers, and even a period spy movie. But his latest film sees him venturing into the genre that made the legendary Akira Kurosawa a household name.

With “The Samurai and the Prisoner”, Kiyoshi Kurosawa makes his first foray into the classic jidaigeki genre. Yet from its opening moments, you would never guess this was his first samurai film. Through an elegant combination of technical precision and creative intuition, Kurasawa transports us back to feudal Japan in a way that fits right in with the samurai classics of the past. Yet his story almost plays like a deconstruction as Kurosawa takes a critical look at the samurai code entire dynasty’s were built upon.

“The Samurai and the Prisoner” is an aggressively faithful adaptation of Honobu Yonezawa’s 2021 novel of the same name. It’s a mostly confined period epic where the bulk of the drama happens within a besieged castle. And though unwieldy and plodding at times, Kurosawa’s script is an intricate and evocative melding of the old and the new, both in its storytelling and its craftsmanship. It’s a chamber drama murder mystery told in a classical style but through a shrewdly modern lens.

The story is set in 16th century Japan as warlord Nobunaga Oda advances west with the aim of ruling the entire country. One of his most trusted retainers, Murashige Araki (Masahiro Motoki) of Arioka Castle in Settsu, suddenly turns against Oda. His reasons are a mystery, but they slowly and clearly come to light through the film’s patient episodic structure. And as the battles with Oda’s forces intensify outside of Murashige’s impregnable fortress, a more cunning war is being waged within his walls that threatens to tear his castle apart from the inside out.

The screws begin to tighten with the arrival of Kanbei (Masaki Suda), a master strategist and Oda’s envoy. Kanbei warns Murashige of Oda’s gathering army and urges him to surrender. Instead of sending him back, Murashige has Kanbei locked in a dungeon, which is his first of several breaks from samurai tradition. A short time later, an unexplained murder inside the castle sparks rumors among the soldiers, prompting Murashige to seek help from an unlikely source – the imprisoned Kanbei.

Kurosawa unwraps much of his story through a number of dense dungeon discussions between the perplexed samurai lord and his crafty captive. What begins as Murashige’s firm establishment of power turns into gripping verbal chess matches between foes. But when Kanbei’s power of deduction leads Murashige towards solving the murder, the prisoner begins earning the trust of the castle’s embattled leader. And that trust grows as Murashige continues to consult Kanbei following a series of other mysteries that threaten his standing among his clans.

The whodunit mysteries themselves shrewdly feed the film’s central storyline. But it’s Murashige’s loyalty to his convictions that adds the most compelling layer. Take his refusal to have a young man crucified as punishment for his father’s shame. Or his choice to have a soldier exiled rather than executed for his betrayal. Murashige’s decisions routinely clash with the rigid and often merciless samurai code. And that challenges those under his command, who find themselves torn between faithfulness to their esteemed leader or to their long-held and deeply rooted customs. It’s a fascinating conflict with no easy resolution.

As the drama unfolds, Kurosawa remains far more intrigued with exploring the intellectual, psychological, existential, and philosophical facets of his story rather than indulge in sword duels and battlefield combat. It’s a focus that can sometimes leave the movie feeling staid, slow-moving, and emotionally distant. And while it’s a handsomely shot film, Kurosawa mostly shuns the idea of thrilling spectacle. Yet “The Samurai and the Prisoner” remains a captivating watch, despite its occasional sluggishness. Kurosawa earns our investment and grounds us in the drama, making this strikingly unique period epic hard to turn away from.

VERDICT – 4 STARS

I know there are passionate superfans out there who will disagree with me, but the Marvel Cinematic Universe has been a shell of its former self since the blockbuster event that was 2019’s “Avengers: Endgame”. A total of 14 movies and 20 streaming series have released since “Endgame”. A couple were nice surprises and a few others were serviceable. But some were glaring disappointments. Even more, none have managed to build up anticipation quite like the MCU did in its heyday.

But one bankable exception has been Spider-Man. Collectively, the three standalone Spider-Man movies have made a whopping $3.94 billion at the global box office. Tom Holland has proven himself to be perfect for the role of Peter Parker, and his three solo films have mostly been solid. Yet none of them stand among the best of the MCU offerings. Well not only does the latest entry, “Spider-Man: Brand New Day”, offer a welcomed refresh for the beloved web-slinger, it’s also the very best Spidey movie of the Tom Holland era.

Destin Daniel Cretton takes the directing reins from Jon Watts and you can quickly tell the difference in his approach. “Brand New Day” has much of the same superhero energy and playfulness as its predecessors. But it stands out as the most emotionally grounded of the now four standalone Spidey films. Even more, its story offers a much needed evolution for the Peter Parker character, exploring themes of loneliness and isolation, while portraying the sacrifice that so often defines true heroism.

For those in need of a quick refresher, in 2021’s “No Way Home” Peter Parker (Holland) makes the choice to have himself erased from everyone’s memory in order to save the multiverse. He makes a pledge to his girlfriend MJ (Zendaya) and best friend Ned (Jacob Batalon) to find them and reintroduce himself when the time is right. And that leads to the events of “Brand New Day”.

As a means of dealing with his loneliness, Peter fully occupies himself with his crime-fighting duties as Spider-Man. About his only means of human connection is with New York City Police Detective Jean DeWolff (Liza Colón-Zayas). Otherwise he has spent what would have been his exciting college years at MIT watching MJ and Ned from afar. Both now live much different lives without any knowledge of Peter. Meanwhile he waits, heartbroken yet determined, for the right time to reveal himself and the truth of their pasts together.

Peter’s personal journey eventually converges with his role of Spider-Man after the appearance of a mysterious antagonist who is able to telepathically hop from person to person, possessing whoever they embody. The telepath targets The Department of Damage Control which prompts its director, Bill Metzger (Tramell Tillman) to reach out the Spider-Man for help. But the telepath isn’t so easily deterred and will stop at nothing to reach the secret which lies inside of the DODC’s vault.

I danced around a lot of information and for good reason. Co-writers Chris McKenna and Erik Sommers pack a ton into their story, much of which is better discovered for yourself. What impresses most is their ability to balance the more intimate personal stakes with the explosive superhero action. While there are plenty of moments for laughs, the film has a more serious tone which allows us to emotionally connect on a surprisingly deeper level, more so than with any of the previous Spidey films. But then there is the action, which features some of the best captured, cut, and choreographed set pieces from the MCU to date.

Smartly, Cretton ensures the characters remain his focal point. This is Holland’s best Peter Parker performance to date while Zendaya and Batalon offer their best supporting work of the series. Beyond them, we get a wild array of side characters and guest appearances highlighted by Jon Bernthal’s killer return as Frank Castle aka The Punisher. While slightly tamed to fit the film’s PG-13 rating, Bernthal still retains Castle’s fury and grit. Mark Ruffalo also returns as Bruce Banner in a role that doesn’t feel necessary, yet that finally gives us a glimpse at the real Hulk that so many of us have been longing for.

The vast majority of the movie comes together incredibly well but there are a few minor issues. There are a couple of appearances that feel thrown in for reasons beyond this story. There’s a storyline involving Peter’s sudden spider mutations that leads to several good scenes but no real conclusion. And there are several instances of things just not making sense. For example, how do some memories click for one character but not for another? It’s a case of the movie opening doors and not always knowing how to close them.

I went into “Brand New Day” interested in it more than excited for it. Then for the first time in years, I left the theater feeling genuine enthusiasm for an MCU movie. Destin Daniel Cretton has rediscovered what makes these movies click, by shedding most of the multiverse baggage and telling a contained story that nicely balances authentic humanity with pulse-pounding superhero thrills. “Brand New Day” may not be the best ever MCU offering, but it definitely sits in the upper tier. And when you’ve put out 38 movies, that’s a pretty impressive accomplishment.

VERDICT – 4 STARS

In the Australian action thriller “Seven Snipers”, Radha Mitchell plays a retired army medic named Kris Hendricks. At least that’s the story she has sold to everyone, including her angsty 16-year-old daughter Anja (Annabel Wolfe). In reality, Kris was a member of an elite sniper squad who went by the codename Voodoo Child. And rather than working in a field hospital, she was eliminating enemy targets to the tune of 116 verified kills. And as usual in movies like this, that violent past comes back to haunt her.

Directed by Sandra Sciberras, “Seven Snipers” is a no-nonsense feature that wastes no time plunging us into the action. And once it does, Sciberras moves her audience along with a tense and tactical pacing that locks us in for the entirety of the film’s lean and efficient 88-minute run time. It also helps us to overlook the minimal backstory and character development, both of which are alluded to more than fleshed out.

Kris and Anja live in a remote farmhouse set upon the sprawling Queensland countryside. Things haven’t been easy for Kris. In addition to raising Anja on her own, she also struggles with compartmentalizing her combat trauma while shielding her daughter from the truth of her violent past. But her good intentions have frustrated Anja, who spends most of her time skipping school with her boyfriend Michael (Lee Tiger Halley).

Their quiet life is interrupted by a terrifying person from her past – a lethal marksman and former warlord known only as “The Dragon” (Tim Roth). The ruthless Dragon sends an envoy (Ryan Kwantan) who Kris promptly sniffs out and eliminates. But before he dies, he leaves her with an ominous message, “He’s coming. Long live the Dragon.” At first the reasons for the Dragon’s sudden reemergence looks to be old-fashioned revenge. But we later learn of a far more precious purpose which adds some extra layers of tension.

But the movie is called “SEVEN Snipers”. Enter Kris’ old squadmate Malcolm (Damien Ryan) who she calls on for help. He brings along four other snipers including his somewhat green son Junior (Charles Cottier), the cynical Nico (Pacharo Mzembe), the all-business Kaldayev (Bianca Wallace), and the silent and stoic Milk (Ioan Gruffudd). The stealthily sinister Dragon is the last person to the dance. And from the first crack of his rifle, we’re convinced that he is a formidable threat.

While it’s hard to miss the lack of depth and detail in both the characters and the overall conflict, there’s something refreshing about its simplicity and straightforwardness. “Seven Snipers” builds itself upon the slightest of stories. But once characters begin peering through their long-range scopes, the intensity builds and the stakes ratchet up a notch. From there it’s all about keeping us gripped, which the movie does through economical direction and an all-in cast who fully understand their assignments.

VERDICT – 3 STARS