Film Review: STREET FIGHTER (2026): An Action-Packed Guilty Pleasure for Fans of the Video Game

Street Fighter Review

Street Fighter (2026) Film Review, a movie directed by Kitao Sakurai, written by T.J. Fixman, Kitao Sakurai and Dalan Musson and starring Noah Centineo, Andrew Koji, Callina Liang, David Dastmalchian, Andrew Schulz, Joe Anoa’i, Cody Rhodes, Jason Momoa, Eric André, 50 Cent, Ma Dong-seok, Mel Jarnson, Orville Peck, Hirooki Goto, Vidyut Jammwal, Olivier Richters, Kyle Mooney and Rayna Vallandingham.

Fans of the old Street Fighter Capcom video game will be happy to know they’ve finally been able to make a watchable movie out of the material showcased in the popular arcade game. Filmmaker Kitao Sakurai finds the right blend of action and humor to keep audiences excited throughout as the movie goes from one fight scene to another with tremendous ease, flowing so well that one will eagerly await the appearance of their next favorite character from the game.

That’s not to say this is a perfect movie, but for what it does, it does it pretty well. This film stars Noah Centineo and Andrew Koji as best friends, Ken Masters and Ryu. These guys are protective of one another even though Ken has been warned that one day, he may have to save Ryu, not only from the bad guys, but from Ryu, himself. Fueled by popular music from the 1990’s, the fight scenes are straight-up entertaining with one sequence perfectly using MC Hammer’s song, “Too Legit to Quit” in the background. These fighters are so legit, the only way they’ll quit is if they’re killed.

Ken and Ryu were trained by Gouken (Ma Dong-seok), who ends up dying at the beginning of the movie, which starts in 1987. Any good Street Fighter movie needs a strong villain and David Dastmalchian is more than up to the task of playing the chief heavy, M. Bison. The villain role needs to be campy and memorable, and Dastmalchian is both of those things, offering some fun negativity to the proceedings.

Of course, Jason Momoa appears as one would expect, judging from the way these action-driven characters look in the picture. Momoa portrays the infamous Blanka, a green electric-charged character who gets some of the movie’s best lines. There are several characters lifted from the games, and the filmmakers knew that Momoa would excel in the most peculiar role the film has to offer, and excel, he does. Momoa fans will not be disappointed by the humor he brings to the part.

Chun-Li is played by Callina Liang, and she’s super into her role, giving the character pizzazz and flair that make her quite enjoyable to watch despite her lack of really in-depth dialogue. Joe Anoa’i plays Akuma, the secret weapon that M. Bison unleashes on Ken and Ryu at the end, and Akuma is appropriately frightening and over-the-top. It’s not an easy win for Ryu by any stretch of the imagination when these two are pitted against one another. Fireballs will fly and people will get kicked left and right through the duration of this film, and fans wouldn’t have it any other way.

There’s a great conclusion to the film where Ryu, barefoot, claims he’s going to walk home as everyone else hops in a car, and it’s a hoot to see where that sequence goes, especially when one character says his pink robe (karate gi) is really white, but got mixed in with different colors of laundry. However, let’s face it – this movie has its limitations. There are some characters here who do lack depth and just exist to move the action along. Centineo and Koji have the most fun while some of the side fighters get lost in the shuffle.

Centineo was the biggest surprise of the movie because he’s so full of on-screen energy. Centineo drives the film a lot more than the sufficient Koji does. Centineo is a ball of fierce light, and he never runs out of steam as he plays Ken with a lot of humor and perseverance. Centineo is really in his comfort zone as Ken, who makes it through the World Warrior Tournament with a little help from his friends, but mostly Centineo’s Ken carries the weight of the film on his own shoulders.

There are some surprise tunes on the soundtrack such as “It’s Raining Men” and other hit songs that you’ll enjoy discovering during the course of the movie. Street Fighter is essentially a movie that will strictly appeal to fans of the video games for nostalgic purposes only. If you’ve never played a game in the series, you’ll be out of your element, trying to figure out the characters and nods to the old school arcade games.

If you haven’t played a game in the series, but want to see Street Fighter, it takes just a few minutes to play a competitor in a game. Going in with no knowledge of this series will only dampen one’s enjoyment of a film with a lot of hidden homages that will bring back the youthful days when (mostly) young males played the video game. That’s not to say there aren’t females who will love the movie too, but a female who never heard of the video game is probably not the target audience for this fun walk down video game memory lane.

Rating: 7/10

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