Street Fighter Review: A Love Letter to the Games With Weird Narrative Momentum

Kitao Sakurai’s Street Fighter understands what makes Capcom’s fighting game series so much fun. The colourful characters, exaggerated personalities, ridiculous costumes and over-the-top fighting techniques all make the jump to live action here with lots of care. Sakurai understands the material, and the film has the sort of campy energy that suits a franchise where martial artists can throw fireballs at each other. It also knows when to let its characters be ridiculous without turning every scene into a joke. Unfortunately, while Street Fighter gets much of the adaptation right, its sluggish storytelling and surprisingly restrained action prevent it from becoming the knockout I wanted it to be.

Everybody Looks Ready for Round Two

One of the film’s biggest strengths is its cast. Noah Centineo makes for a convincing Ken Masters, while Andrew Koji brings the right intensity to Ryu. Callina Liang’s Chun-Li fits comfortably into the film’s world, and David Dastmalchian has a good time playing M. Bison. The performances strike a sensible balance between the exaggerated mannerisms expected of these characters and the seriousness required by the story. Nobody seems embarrassed by the material, and nobody pushes the campiness so far that the characters become caricatures.

Andrew Schulz is another pleasant surprise as Dan Hibiki, whose personality fits the film’s more comedic side. Jason Momoa’s Blanka and Curtis “50 Cent” Jackson’s Balrog make good use of their distinctive looks, while Vidyut Jammwal leaves a favourable impression as Dhalsim despite receiving limited screen time. I would have liked to see more of Jammwal, particularly given how well suited he is to the role. The rest of the ensemble also fits the parts, and the casting generally feels like a considered attempt to bring the games’ colourful roster to life.

Sakurai and the cast also deserve credit for getting the characters’ mannerisms right. Their dialogue can be deliberately cartoonish, their reactions can be exaggerated, and their behaviour sometimes makes little sense outside the logic of a fighting game. These traits are part of Street Fighter’s identity, though, and the film rarely feels embarrassed by them. There are a few liberties taken with some characters, but they do little to undermine the overall adaptation.

The costumes deserve similar praise. Many of these designs could have looked absurd when translated into live action, yet the film makes a convincing effort to reproduce the characters’ familiar appearances. The details matter here, from their distinctive outfits to the physical traits that make each fighter recognisable. Street Fighter understands that these characters have visual identities that are inseparable from their personalities, and the production puts in the work to preserve them.

A Hadouken for the Nostalgic

Sakurai makes considerable use of practical effects rather than relying on computer-generated imagery for everything, which helps give the action a physical quality. The effects used for Ryu’s Hadouken and the more fantastical characters are convincing enough. The film rarely makes its visual tricks feel distracting or cheap.

The film uses hand-drawn animated sequences for flashbacks. The approach gives the characters’ histories a different visual identity while avoiding the need to recreate every fantastical event through live-action effects. It also feels appropriate for a property that originated in video games, where stylised character illustrations have always played an important role in establishing its identity. These sequences communicate the necessary information without interrupting the film to explain every detail at length.

The soundtrack has a similar appreciation for the source material. Familiar musical cues and character themes provide welcome reminders of the games, and the sound design does enough to support the fights without becoming overbearing. For those who know the franchise, these touches make the adaptation feel connected to its origins.

The Final Round Needs a Better Script

Set six years after Ryu defeats Sagat in the first World Warrior tournament, Street Fighter follows Ryu, Ken Masters and Chun-Li as they reunite for a new tournament organised by M. Bison, the ruthless dictator of Shadaloo. Chun-Li recruits the two fighters for her own reasons, seeking revenge for her father’s death at Bison’s hands, while Ryu and Ken confront their troubled past and the differences that drove them apart. As Bison pursues his own plans, the tournament soon turns into a fight for survival.

While the premise is apt, the writing is the film’s most significant weakness. Sakurai and screenwriter T. J. Fixman devote considerable attention to translating the characters, costumes and visual identity of Street Fighter into live action, but the narrative lacks the same level of care. There is enough material here for a straightforward martial arts adventure, but the screenplay struggles to turn these ingredients into a consistently engaging story.

The pacing suffers as a result. Various sections feel as though the film has stopped making meaningful progress, with scenes arriving one after another without building sufficient anticipation for what comes next. The character interactions and occasional action sequences provide welcome breaks, but they cannot sustain the film when the larger narrative loses momentum. Even the dialogue, which works well when the film embraces its sillier side, lacks the consistency needed to carry the quieter stretches.

So much of the adaptation feels considered, so this is puzzling to me. The film knows how these characters should look, behave and fight, yet it struggles to give their encounters a compelling dramatic structure. Its efforts to honour the source material are clear, but fidelity to the games cannot compensate for scenes that drag or conflicts that fail to develop.

The ending compounds these problems. Rather than delivering a satisfying climax that brings the main conflicts to a meaningful close, the film finishes on an awkward cliffhanger that leaves the experience feeling incomplete.

Holding Back

But the biggest disappointment is the action itself. Street Fighter is built around fighting, and the film’s choreography is frequently good. The performers commit to the physical demands of their roles, and the fights capture enough of the games’ movements to make the transition to live action convincing. But the film does little with these foundations. The intensity suggested by the trailers rarely translates into the kind of escalating action that should define a tournament featuring this many formidable fighters.

Even the bigger confrontations feel surprisingly restrained. I expected more variety in the characters’ special moves, more inventive use of their abilities, and fights that pushed the limits of what this fictional world could offer. Instead, the film often settles for competent hand-to-hand combat when it has every opportunity to make its battles more exciting. The choreography itself is rarely the issue. The direction simply does not push it far enough, leaving several encounters feeling smaller than their participants warrant.