About the film (courtesy of Universal Pictures):
From Nintendo and Illumination comes a new animated film based on the world of Super Mario Bros.

Do any of you remember the live-action movie, Super Mario Bros. (1993) that starred Bob Hoskins and John Leguizamo? If you’ve never seen it, consider yourself lucky. But if you did spend time enduring the less-than-stellar adaptation, I’m sorry and just know early on that this animated version is far more enjoyable from every conceivable angle. I realize that’s not saying much, but The Super Mario Bros. Movie is a full jump in overall quality.

Mario (voiced by Chris Pratt) and Luigi (Charlie Day) find themselves far from Brooklyn, smack dab in the middle of some strange far away land where basically everything is under siege by the evil Bowser (voiced by Jack Black) and his minions. These plumbers by trade end up on a wild adventure that includes a princess (voiced by Anya Taylor-Joy) and a mouthy gorilla (voiced by Seth Rogen).

Legacy fans (that sounds better than adults over the age of…, well that number doesn’t really matter) should get a real kick of the nostalgia found in The Super Mario Bros. Movie. At almost every jump, turn and bounce there’s something familiar to behold. From the music, to the scenery, to the characters and every the action, audiences will be transported back to days of their youth mashing buttons while feeling both frustrations and great sense of accomplishment. This happens to be one of those movie outings that you won’t mind taking your younger ones to the theaters and seeing.

Now, speaking of the younger ones, The Super Mario Bros. Movie is rated PG and only runs about 90 minutes. These are two promising attributes to have if you’re catering to a younger audience, which clearly this movie is doing. With all of the colorful characters, backdrops and dialogue, this could potentially be a big hit for the little ones. It’s the tweens that will probably show little interest, which could hurt the overall numbers here.

Universal Pictures, Nintendo and Illumination have done all they can to help make for a successful launch of The Super Mario Bros. Movie. Hopefully their numbers reflect this during a weekend of rather stiff competition. It’ll just be a matter of where the focus will be for entertainment because there is decent competition spread across different demographics and it’ll all come down to who wins the decision battle before heading out to theaters.

The good thing is that there’s nothing overly questionable as far as content goes, so this is definitely choice number 1 for a family outing if you have children under the age of ten. The Super Mario Bros. Movie should be a steady contender throughout this holiday weekend. You can catch this one only in theaters starting Wednesday, April 5th.