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Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li

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Street Fighter:
The Legend of Chun-Li
Promotional film poster
Directed byAndrzej Bartkowiak
Written byJustin Marks
Produced byPatrick Aiello
Ashok Amritraj
StarringKristin Kreuk
Neal McDonough
Chris Klein
Michael Clarke Duncan
Taboo
Robin Shou
Moon Bloodgood
CinematographyGeoff Boyle
Edited byDerek Brechin
Niven Howie
Music byStephen Endelman
Distributed by20th Century Fox
Release dates
United States:
February 27, 2009
Japan:
February 28, 2009
Running time
96 min.
CountriesIndia
Canada
Japan
United States
LanguageEnglish
Budget$60 million

Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li is a film and the second live-action film based on the Street Fighter series of video games. It follows the quest of Street Fighter character Chun-Li, who is portrayed by Smallville star Kristin Kreuk.[1] The story follows Chun-Li's personal history and her journey for justice.[2] The film co-stars Neal McDonough as M. Bison, Chris Klein as Charlie, Michael Clarke Duncan as Balrog, and Black Eyed Peas singer Taboo as Vega. The film was released on February 27, 2009.

Plot

The movie opens with Chun Li narrating her experience growing up aspiring to be a concert pianist. As a child, she moves from San Francisco to Hong Kong with her family. There, along with piano, she learns Wushu from her father, Xiang, who is a well connected businessman. One night, her home is attacked by Bison and his henchman. Chun Li's father fights them off until Balrog grabs a hold of a young Chun Li, forcing him to surrender. As Bison and his men are leaving with Xiang, Chun Li's mother tries to stop them. Balrog just punches her.

Years later, Chun Li grows up and becomes a talented concert pianist. At the end of one of her concerts, she receives a scroll written in Ancient Chinese text. On her way home, she sees a mysterious homeless man getting assaulted by street thugs. After the thugs leave, Chun Li tends to him and notices a spiderweb tattoo on his hand. Meanwhile, Xiang is shown working for Bison as a prisoner. In return for his services, he is allowed to view pictures of his daughter all grown up. Back home, Chun Li's mother finally loses her battle to cancer as Chun Li and her servants mourn her loss at a funeral.

Elsewhere, we see Nash and Maya investigating a murder of several heads of criminal syndicate families in Bangkok. Chun Li on the side is meeting with a wise old lady in town who studies the scroll and tells her to find a man named Gen in Bangkok, revealing to her an image of the same spiderweb she saw tattooed on the homeless man's hand. With a new goal in mind, Chun Li leaves her home and heads to Bangkok. After weeks of searching for Gen without any luck, she sees a man being assaulted in an alley by thugs. Chun Li comes to his rescue and fights them. After a long battle ended by finishing them with a Bike Rack Drop Ultra move, Chun Li collapses in exhaustion. There, we see Gen pick her up to take her to his home.

Gen tells Chun Li that he knows how to find her father and that Bison has him, but that she also needs anger management. In response, she goes to an internet cafe and logs onto shoryuken.com to find out more about Bison, who is now holding the families of property owners hostage in order to force them to sign their property over to him. Upon leaving, one of the owners is asked to hand over the rights to a docking harbor, allowing the shipment of the "White Rose". Chun Li overhears this. Meanwhile at Interpol, Nash figures out that Bison's headquarters are right across the street from the Police Station.

Later that night, Cantana, one of Bison's secretaries, goes to a nightclub. Chun Li spies on her and notices her jocking the girls in the club. Chun Li moves in and seductively dances with her before casually walking away into the bathroom. Cantana, sex driven, follows her and locks the bathroom door. There, Chun Li beats her into giving out the location of the White Rose. Cantana's bodyguards come back and Chun Li escapes after fighting them off.

We are then told of Bison's origins. He is the son of Irish missionaries. He grew up an orphan having to steal fish from people in Thailand. In order to lose his conscience, he forced his daughter out of the womb of his wife prematurely. This transferred his conscience into her, thus Bison nolonger had/has a conscience. Back at Gen's home, Bison's henchmen come after Gen and Chun Li. Gen fights them off until Balrog blows up his house with a RPG. With Gen gone and nowhere to be found, Chun Li runs off. She is then attacked by Vega, who she defeats soundly and hangs upside down over the side of a building.

Chun Li then heads to the harbor and interrogates an employee into telling her the arrival time of the White Rose. Later that night, this turns out to be a trap as several Shadaloo soldiers capture her. Chun Li is then taken back to Shadaloo headquarters and is reunited with her father. Bison tells her that Xiang outlived his usefulness and breaks his neck, killing him. Bison and Balrog leave Chun Li to the henchman to finish off. Chun Li however escapes when they try to swing her around from the ceiling like a pinata. As she runs away, she is shot in the arm by Balrog. Before Balrog could recapture her, the crowd begins throwing durians at him. This scares Balrog as he drives off in his Mercedes-Benz. Chun Li meanwhile, is rescued again by Gen, who narrowly escaped death and survived the explosion in his house.

Chun Li approaches Nash and tells him she needs backup to take down Bison. Nash and Maya oblige as Chun Li approaches the dock employee who set her up last time. The employee tells her that he was forced into deceiving her and tells her the real arrival time. Chun Li doubts him at first, but he points to the white board at the arrival time, proving that it is true. At the dock later that night, Interpol agents engage in a shootout with Shadaloo soldiers. On a ship, Chun Li finds a girl asking where her father is. Meanwhile, Gen fights Balrog and kills him by stabbing him with a pipe spraying nitrogen. We later find out that the girl is Bison's daughter and her name is Rose, making her the White Rose. Bison takes her in and welcomes her warmly.

Bison walks into his office where he is ambushed by Gen. Gen however is no match for him. Sensing his daughter in danger, Bison goes back to his daughters room, where he finds she is gone. Gen shows up again and ambushes Bison, getting beaten up again. Chun Li then comes in and fights Bison. After a long battle, she hits him with a bamboo pole and drops sandbags on him, startling him and making him unaware of what is going on. She then charges up a Kikoken and shoots it at him, knocking him off the scaffolding they were fighting on, then jumping on his head and twisting it all the way around, breaking his neck and killing him.

Back home, Chun Li is settled down as Gen pays her a visit. He shows her an ad for a Street Fighter tournament, telling her about a Japanese fighter named "Ryu something". Chun Li declines, saying that she's home for now.

Cast

Shooting locations

Production

Rick Yune was originally cast as Gen but has been replaced by Robin Shou, who played as Liu Kang in the Mortal Kombat films.[3]

Reception

Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li received generally negative reviews and was not pre-screened for critics,[4]. The film ranking website Rotten Tomatoes reported that 4% of critics had given the film positive reviews, based upon a sample of 45.[5] At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the film has received an average score of 17, based on 10 reviews.[6] Amongst the more positive reviews, Rob Nelson of Variety wrote that "Neither the best nor the worst of movies derived from videogames, Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li at least gives action fans plenty to ogle besides the titular heroine (Kristin Kreuk)".[6] while The New York Times wrote that the film was "Reveling in the vivid Bangkok locations, Geoff Boyle's photography is crisp and bright, and Dion Lam's action choreography unusually witty".[6] Negative reviews focused on the screenplay and fight scenes. The Hollywood Reporter wrote that "other than a few reasonably well-staged fight sequences, the proceedings are dull and visually uninspired. Justin Marks' solemn screenplay lacks any trace of wit."[6] Jeremy Wheeler of TV Guide wrote that "Fight scenes, while admirable for shaking off the shaky-cam aesthetic of their big-screen brethren, neither inspire nor find a good balance between martial arts and FX-laden power punches".[7] IGN gave the movie 1.5 stars out of 5, saying "There's better staged and more enjoyable brawls between Peter and the Chicken on Family Guy." They also stated the original live-action Street Fighter film was more enjoyable than The Legend of Chun-Li.

References

  1. ^ "Casting: Kreuk streetfights, Kitsch is Gambit". TV.com. Retrieved March 3. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |accessdate= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
  2. ^ "Street Fighter The Legend of Chun-Li".
  3. ^ Gibson, Ellie (2008-03-19). "Street Fighter film out next year". EuroGamer. Retrieved 2008-03-22. {{cite web}}: Check date values in: |date= (help); Unknown parameter |accessyear= ignored (|access-date= suggested) (help)
  4. ^ "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li - The Onion A.V. Club". The Onion. Retrieved 2009-02-28.
  5. ^ "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li - Rotten Tomatoes". Rotten Tomatoes. IGN Entertainment, Inc. Retrieved 2009-03-06.
  6. ^ a b c d "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li (2009): Reviews". Metacritic. CNET Networks, Inc. Retrieved 2009-03-05.
  7. ^ "Street Fighter: The Legend of Chun-Li - TV Guide". TV Guide. Retrieved 2009-02-28.
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