Ages ago (back in November 2008) I popped in a quick blog post asking the question as to whatever happened to SA actress/singer export Candice Hillebrand, ending off with the announcement that she landed the role of Nina Williams in the upcoming Tekken live-action movie. Well, in the meantime production on the film has nearly been wrapped up and despite the fact that we all know it is going to suck thanks to the fact that movies based on fighting games, particularly fighting tournaments, have always sucked, I must say that from the images released so far, this movie has got to be given credit for capturing the feel of the game as closely as what it has.
It’s got a couple of recognisable names in the forms of Jon Foo, Kelly Overton, Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, Ian Anthony Dale, Cung Le, Darrin Dewitt Henson and Luke Goss, and is directed by Dwight H. Little who has a couple of movies to his name like Deep Blue, Murder at 1600 and The Phantom of the Opera (1989 horror).
As for the film summary itself, Tekken is set in 2039, an apocalyptic world that has been ravaged by the great World Wars. Governments no longer exist, instead replaced by corporations, the mightiest of which is the Mishima Zaibatsu. In order to entertain the seething masses of its territory, Mishima organises the King of Iron Fist Tournament which rewards the last man standing with a lifetime of stardom and wealth. Jin Kazama is a rebellious teenage street fighter who enters the tournament in order to avenge the death of his mother which he blames upon Mishima Zaibatsu’s powerful chairman, Heihachi Mishima. But getting to the end of the tournament and exposing the dark underbelly of Tekken along the way is not going to be an easy task – particularly when you are still in the process of battling your own inner demons first!
Now as I obviously haven’t seen the movie myself yet, I can’t really judge it too harshly or even analyse it just yet, but looking at the pictures below, shame, Candice really could have been given a better fitting costume to work with, don’t you think? :)
Related Link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tekken_(film)