The tiny truants and curiosity seekers who turned up at the first showing of "Super Mario Brothers," which opened yesterday at neighborhood theaters without benefit of advance screenings, must have been awfully surprised. This bizarre, special effects-filled movie doesn't have the jaunty hop-and-zap spirit of the Nintendo video game from which it takes -- ahem -- its inspiration. What it has instead are a weird, jokey science-fiction story, "Batman"-caliber violence and enough computer-generated dinosaurs to get the jump on "Jurassic Park."
Eleven-year-old boys, the ideal viewers for this vigorous live-action comic strip, will no doubt be impressed with the expense and energy that have gone into bringing "Super Mario Brothers" to the screen. Other viewers may wonder how they came to be watching a film about parallel universes, punitive devolution, creatures who eat grilled salamanders on hot-dog rolls, and one memorably disgusting character who has been transformed into a ball of slime.
The answer doubtless has more to do with marketing tie-ins than with creative thinking. Allowing for that, and for the total superfluity of this whole enterprise, "Super Mario Brothers" is not without its selling points. This film's two directors and three screenwriters have clearly tried hard to breathe life into their nonstory, to the point where the film's intensity seems more crazy than cynical. And its special effects are well executed even when their purpose is less than clear.
The plot? Sit down. There were dinosaurs in Brooklyn. They wound up in quasi-human form living somewhere far beneath the East River. Their leader is King Koopa (Dennis Hopper), whose ridged, reptilian coiffure contributes to the film's bad-hair-day motif. Princess Daisy (Samantha Mathis), who hatched out of her egg in a Brooklyn convent, has been kidnapped by Koopa so that he can get her magic meteorite fragment, which can be used to bring the two universes together. Only the Mario brothers, Luigi (John Leguizamo) and Mario (Bob Hoskins), can prevent this terrible thing from happening. Perhaps only the Mario brothers can figure it out.
Aside from Mr. Hoskins's furry mustache and the fact that the Marios are still plumbers, the film doesn't pay a lot of attention to its video-game roots. Instead, it has fun with minor characters (Fisher Stevens and Richard Edson as two cartoonish creeps) and sly little touches, like the campaign posters that show Koopa cuddling a baby and stating his political ideas. ("Don't worry -- we'll get more" is Koopa's position on the environment.)
Broader strokes include a lot of lizard references, a cuddly and believable dinosaur as a household pet, and the special effects that transform Koopa's subjects into pin-headed, grinning dinos in storm-trooper garb. The last conceit is rendered less grotesque by the fact that the troops get silly when they hear the love theme from "Dr. Zhivago."
Under these scene-stealing circumstances and the constraints of a plot that turns barely comprehensible in its last half-hour, it's remarkable that the human actors fare as decently as they do. Apparently Mr. Hoskins can handle any role with grace and good humor. Ms. Mathis and Mr. Leguizamo make likable ingenues. Mr. Stevens and Mr. Edson, who are mercifully given a brain-power transplant midway through the movie, come closest to the wired, antic spirit of the Nintendo original.
Mr. Hopper is alarmingly natural in the role of a highly evolved tyrannosaurus rex who happens to have a wonderful way with platitudes. He seems entirely comfortable with everything he has to do here, from wallowing in a mud bath to describing himself as linked to "that little part of all of us that can't stand to see someone else in need or pain." Look for some fun clips from this one when the Film Society of Lincoln Center honors Mr. Hopper in the year 2005.
"Super Mario Brothers" is rated PG. It includes some minor sexual suggestiveness and the kind of strange, spooky violence that could upset young children. SUPER MARIO BROTHERS Directed by Rocky Morton and Annabel Jankel; written by Parker Bennett, Terry Runte and Ed Solomon; director of photography, Dean Semler; edited by Mark Goldblatt; music by Alan Silvestri; production designer, David L. Snyder; produced by Jake Eberts and Roland Joffe; co-producer, Fred Caruso; released by Hollywood Pictures. Running time: 104 minutes. This film is rated PG. Mario Mario . . . Bob Hoskins Luigi Mario . . . John Leguizamo King Koopa . . . Dennis Hopper Daisy . . . Samantha Mathis Iggy . . . Fisher Stevens Spike . . . Richard Edson Lena . . . Fiona Shaw Daniella . . . Dana Kaminski Toad . . . Mojo Nixon Scapelli . . . Gianni Russo Bertha . . . Francesca Roberts The King . . . Lance Henriksen Old Lady . . . Sylvia Harman Angelica . . . Desiree Marie Velez