There was a time not all that long ago when it felt like Hollywood was never going to crack the code on video game movies. They consistently fell short of the mark critically, commercially, or, more often than not, both. With “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” Nintendo finally managed to bring its beloved characters to the screen with astounding levels of success. This animated film from the folks at Illumination more than made up for the sins of 1993’s “Super Mario Bros.” More than that, it established a new ceiling for video game movies, proving to Hollywood at large that, when executed correctly, audiences will turn up for these adaptations. In this case, the secret sauce proved to be making an up-the-middle, family-friendly adventure.
Ranking as the second-biggest movie of 2023 overall, “Mario” pulled in an astounding $1.36 billion worldwide, including $575 million domestically and $788 million internationally. To sweeten the pot, Universal Pictures and Nintendo managed to make the film for a very reasonable $100 million, meaning the windfall of profits from this venture is going to be massive. It may well usher in the golden age of video game movies, much like Sam Raimi’s “Spider-Man” truly ushered in the superhero era after movies like “X-Men” and “Blade” cracked the door open. Similarly, “Sonic the Hedgehog” and “Detective Pikachu” walked so that Mario and Luigi could run.
It probably shouldn’t surprise anyone that an animated “Mario” movie was successful, but anyone who says they predicted that this movie was going to be this big of a hit is either Nostradamus or a liar.