Probably the Dumbest Thing Ever

I don’t think anyone would call the 1995 Mortal Kombat film a formative title. It was a very silly, very fun movie that followed in the footsteps of the game it was based on, copying the major beats of Enter the Dragon to make a martial arts film that just kind of worked. I wouldn’t necessarily call it bad, but you have to be in the mood for a certain kind of cheesy silliness to be able to enjoy Mortal Kombat for what it is, but if you could, it’s a trip. Certainly audiences at the time enjoyed it well enough to make it one of the most successful video game adaptations ever, although considering the competition at the time was the likes of Street Fighter and Double Dragon, that really wasn’t saying much.

I thought about Mortal Kombat a lot watching DOA: Dead or Alive, a film that borrows liberally from the same formula. Both films are, in essence, taking the bones of Enter the Dragon – a tournament of the best fighters from around the world, put on by an evil man with a dark secret – to stage a series of fights on an island. And, like, Mortal Kombat, DOA: Dead or Alive is a very silly, very cheesy movie. The key difference between the two, aside from the fact that DOA: Dead or Alive doesn’t have the fantasy elements that Mortal Kombat could tap into and instead swaps in sexy girls, is that DOA: Dead or Alive also absolutely bombed at the Box Office.

Going back and watching the film, you can see why the film tanked out, making only $7 Mil against its $30 Mil production budget. The film is, without a doubt, bad. Anyone wanting an action thrill ride that just so happened to feature sexy characters from the Dead or Alive series (upon which this 2006 film was, of course, adapted) got something decidedly less than that. The film is more of an action-comedy with wuxia elements, a light-hearted and silly adventure that is willing to indulge in plenty of eye candy as well (it even features a two-on-two beach volleyball sequence, just like the video games series it’s based on). It is not a strong movie at all, not even for fans of the games.

And yet, despite this, it is oddly watchable. Yes, it’s bad. It’s not a good movie. But it’s bad and silly in the same way that 1995’s Mortal Kombat is bad and silly. It has the same vibe, the same plotting, the same kind of humor that Mortal Kombat had and, if it had come out in the 1990s instead of 2006, I actually think DOA: Dead or Alive could have done pretty well for itself in theaters. It had that right mix audiences were looking for. It just had the misfortune to come out at a time when people were expecting a little more from the video game adaptations, and DOA: Dead or Alive simply couldn’t compete.

The film focuses on three ladies. The first, Kasumi (Devon Aoki), is a ninja princess and the current leader of her clan. She chooses to leave her clan, though, so she can pursue her brother, who disappeared a year earlier when he went off to fight in the DOA tournament and, supposedly, died. She wants answers. Tina Armstrong (Jaime Pressly) is a former professional wrestler looking to get out of the business and prove herself as a real fighter. And Christie Allen (Holly Valance) is a thief and assassin who wants to get into DOA so she can not only earn the $5 Mil cash prize afforded to the winner but also to steal the hundreds of millions she and her partner, Max (Matthew Marsden), assume is on the island.

Each of these ladies, and many more, end up on the island to compete in DOA. But while the tournament seems fair, there’s clearly something going on behind the scenes, something that should make each of them question their participation. The tournament’s leader, Victor Donovan (Eric Roberts), is up to something, and the more that Kasumi digs around, looking for clues about her brother, the more she begins to suspect that this tournament isn’t really about finding the best fighter at all. Evil is afoot, and before too long all the fighters in the tournament are going to have to step up and fight for their freedom.

I’m going to be honest and state that I haven’t played any of the Dead or Alive games. I know they exist, that they are a popular series of fighting games that, yes, feature plenty of scantily clad ladies and a whole lot of cheesecake. Not that the cheesecake is their only claim to fame as the games were designed by Team Ninja, who know their way around fighting mechanics and brawling. The fighting games are legit, from everything I’ve seen, they just also have that other layer of cheesecake as well that gets people to take notice. There’s a reason they did a beach volleyball series of games for the franchise, with all the ladies in tiny bikinis bouncing around in the sand. They know their audience.

I don’t know if DOA: Dead or Alive follows the story of any specific game or character properly or not. If it does then that’s fair, but I don’t think the film does a solid job of adapting whatever it was working off of, that’s for sure. Even if it hits all the beats of the story from the video games, it still comes across as a shallow, silly, poorly written mess. Characters have some of the worst dialogue you’ll ever hear, flatly declaring facts and information, as well as their intentions, like they’re reading lines of text instead of actually conversing. Most characters don’t have any motivation to be involved in the story except, “hey, I wanna compete in a tournament.” Nothing really hangs together well, outside of Kasumi and her goals. It’s just bad.

And yet, because of that, the film can get away with a lot. It’s so proud to exist, to just be there to have fun and hang out, that it decides to throw everything it can at the screen whether it really works or not. Kasumi is introduced running from her clan, bouncing along the heads of warriors like she’s floating in a wuxia film, only to leap over the walls of her compound, skydive off over the mountain, and then pop a hang glider out from under her dress to sail away into the blue sky beyond. Why, because it’s cool, and that seems to be the justification for everything in the film.

Most of the time, stuff just randomly happens because the creators of the film thought it would be neat. The fights are random and chaotic and, frequently, not even well directed, but they certainly go over the top every chance they get. A sequence early on where the three main girls have to scale an ancient temple to get into the island compound serves absolutely no purpose except to show off some action and wirework. Multiple fights try to recreate moves and combos for the fighters from the games, but they just look silly in a live-action context. Nothing really looks good or right, but it all has a charming stupidity that can’t be denied.

About the only place where the film actually nails things properly is in hiring Jaime Pressly. She’s the one actor in this whole film who actually is able to nail the tone of the film while still delivering an actual performance. While other actors in the film feel stilted and weird in all their line deliveries, Pressly is somehow able to make it all seem natural. She had previously been in Not Another Teen Movie, and was also starring in My Name is Earl, so she knew how to balance character work with silly comedy. She understood the role for DOA: Dead or Alive, and her scenes are the best in the film.

But on the whole this movie doesn’t work, not as an actual real movie that was meant to make money. It’s silly and dumb and bad, and I’m not in the least surprised audiences didn’t take to it. And yet, as a piece of media to put on and laugh at, the film is really fun. Nothing works, nothing makes sense, and it all leads to a complete mess of a viewing experience, but the film has its messy charms because of it. You don’t watch this because it’s good, you watch DOA: Dead or Alive because it’s bad, and you have a fantastic time. It’s so bad it’s nearly good in the worst possible way, and there’s no denying that, on that level, it does somehow find a way to work again. Just don’t expect it to be good and you’ll do just fine.