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The Super Mario Bros. Movie has been an astronomical success by any method of measurement. The film continues to rock the box office, setting records left and right and inching close to $1 billion in revenue. Without a doubt, Nintendo and all parties involve have to consider this a monumental success.

One person blown away by the movie’s juggernaut status is Shigeru Miyamoto. In an interview with Japanese press (translated by Videogames Chronicle), Miyamoto said that even he was shocked by the movie’s level of success, and he thinks that the lackluster reviews from critics may have helped the movie in the longrun.

“I did have a level of expectations that this movie would also do well [like the Super Nintendo World theme park], but I was very surprised that it went beyond what I could have imagined when it finally came out.

You need some luck to achieve this level of success for a film. While many foreign critics have given the movie relatively low ratings, I think that also contributed to the movie’s notoriety and buzz.

I’d be happy if viewers could say that the definition of what a movie is has changed because of this film. That just shows how lucky we were.”

[Shigeru Miyamoto]

The Super Mario Bros. Movie seemed destined to succeed, but now it’s definitely the high watermark for game-to-movie adaptations. Will anything be able to top it going forward? I guess we’ll have to hang in there and see!

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Comments (4)

tendonin

11M ago

He left luck to heaven. And heaven said "Sure."

With various comments from completely different parts of the film industry, it's starting to seem like Cinema(tm) is becoming more a domain of celebrating pre-existing ideas than where the new ideas come from. I guess being able to ride that trend is where the "luck" comes in.


kuribo

11M ago

“Critics” should be largely ignored. No idea what they really expected from a Super Mario Bros movie.


ngamer01

11M ago

@kuribo

A film where Peach is the star from start to finish and she has to rescue Mario and Luigi alone and make them look stupid in the process?

Jokes aside, I've seen people trash it because Peach isn't a total damsel in distress in this movie. Hello, movie Peach is based on her incarnations from Super Show, Adventures of SMB 3, and the Mario World cartoon. While Peach got kidnapped on occasion in those cartoons, she also has fought and stopped Bowser's plans too in the cartoons.

Anyways if you hated the DiC cartoons, the movie won't change your mind unfortunately.

Edited 3 times

I know what you mean but there is a sea between being a classic damsel in distress and Peach in the movie.
They made her a feminist caricature when it could have been more subtle to show Mario is the hero instead of the sidesick, i liked the idea of Peach teaming up with Mario and Toad to save the Kingdom but there is nothing wrong with, for example showing emotion when the big monster arrives with his army and asks her to marry him, instead its just anger and more anger,badass fight,and smug.Peach was the powerhouse

She could have helped without the movie implying Peach can beat Bowser with one hand 🤷‍♂️

Anyways it is what it is, still a good Movie Miyamoto is right those critics suck