Mortal Kombat
New Line Cinema | Release Date: August 18, 1995 CRITIC SCORE DISTRIBUTION
59
METASCORE
Mixed or average reviews based on 14 Critic Reviews
Positive:
5
Mixed:
8
Negative:
1
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Critic Reviews

Critic scorePublicationBy date
90
Los Angeles TimesKevin Thomas
A martial arts action-adventure with wondrous special effects and witty production design, it effectively combines supernatural terror, a mythical slay-the-dragon, save-the-princess odyssey and even a spiritual quest for self-knowledge. [21 Aug 1995 Pg. F3]
75
Christian Science MonitorPeter Rainer
It is one continuous fight sequence from opening scene to final credits, but lacks the blood, profanity, and gore that would have merited a more adult rating. Read full review
70
The New York TimesStephen Holden
The movie's extensive martial arts sequences, in which combatants bounce off each other doing triple handsprings, suggest a slightly more earthbound version of the aerial ballets in Hong Kong action-adventure films. Read full review
70
VarietyLeonard Klady
But where others have sunk in the mire of imitation, director Paul Anderson and writer Kevin Droney effect a viable balance between exquisitely choreographed action and ironic visual and verbal counterpoint. Read full review
63
TV Guide MagazineStaff (Not Credited)
Expect lots of earsplitting music, garish visuals and badly staged martial arts action. Read full review
60
Washington PostRichard Harrington
A mix of martial-arts and special-effects magic, the film serves its nonstop confrontations either straight up or with a twist (as when they involve Kombatants with special powers, like Sub-Zero, Reptile and Scorpion). Read full review
60
EmpireKim Newman
The filmmakers try to solve the problem of turning an experience which merely consists of a series of fights into a story by... ignoring it, presenting a film which merely consists of a series of fights. Read full review
60
IGNMitchell Saltzman
The Mortal Kombat games are all about having fun, and so is the movie, whether it's "good" cinema or not. Read full review
58
Entertainment WeeklyLisa Schwarzbaum
And although director Paul Anderson treats the story with appropriate deadpan respect, there are enough sparks of humor (particularly generated by Linden Ashby as a shallow martial-arts actor who worries that he's a fake, with good reason) to amuse the adults accompanying the 10-year-old boys in the audience. Read full review
50
Austin ChronicleMarc Savlov
It is, in essence, the video game transferred part and parcel to the screen, and very well at that. Read full review
50
San Francisco ChronicleLaura Evenson
Mortal Kombat the movie has everything a teenage boy could want: snakes that jut out of a villain's palms, acrobatic kung- fu fighting and a couple of battling babes. Everything, that is, but an interesting plot, decent dialogue and compelling acting Read full review
50
The New YorkerBruce Diones
But soon the movie falls flat under an uninspired good-versus-evil plot and pathetically simpleminded dialogue. Read full review
50
USA TodaySusan Wloszczyna
Just like the popular (and more graphically violent) video game it's spun from, kung-fooy and kartoony Kombat shoves plot and personality aside to focus on action cloaked in mystic mumbo-jumbo and gloomy mock-gothic graphics. [21 Aug 1995 Pg. 03.D]
30
Film ThreatAlan Ng
The bright spot of Paul W.S. Anderson’s film is the villains. Read full review
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