It clicked, netting that euphoria that often hovers over beautiful, young, freshly rich people. At some point in the meal, a herd of assistants beckoned a frail man to the table, seating the figure across from Byron Mann and Damian Chapa. Neither young actor recognized the mysterious figure as Raul Julia, the commanding Hispanic actor. Not long before the shoot, Julia had undergone surgery for stomach cancer; the illness would take his life within the year.
Because the production crew hadn't been notified of Julia's condition prior to the star's arrival, their shooting schedule didn't consider the low energy and intense weight loss of its lead. Originally, production would have begun with Julia's dialogue-dense scene work, allowing the stunt team to prep and rehearse action sequences for the latter half of the shoot.
De Souza knew he couldn't film Julia up close, not like this. Julia needed considerable time to regain body mass, so fights and action sequences — those not featuring Julia — were bumped forward, and the schedule was essentially flipped. Action first, drama second. Julia spent the first few weeks of production in recovery. His kids — invited to join their father on the shoot — made the trip into a family vacation, swimming with porpoises, scuba diving and later discovering the Australian outback.
The ailing man's spirits lifted and his body gradually took on weight. Watching the film, you can see Julia's declining health is carefully concealed by makeup and wide shots. The frail and sinewy figure that materialized at that dinner in Bangkok appears only in a laboratory scene from week one of production. This Julia's cheeks are sallow, his eyes floating like moons in space. For me, it was beautiful [ The cast and crew, respecting the severity of Julia's condition, agreed to the last-minute schedule rehaul.
Arguably most impacted by the changes was Charlie Picerni. The stunt coordinator, who'd requested months prior to rehearse with cast before shooting, was meeting many actors for the first time on set. And now, at de Souza's request, he had to train, choreograph and shoot fight sequences on an immediate turnaround. They were fighting — about 10 stunt takes. That's a big thing. You have to have rehearsal time. That's the bottom line. You have to have rehearsal time and I didn't have any.
With each day focused on immediate turnaround, the stunt team couldn't prep actors for upcoming shoots. I was prepared, but some of the actors were a bit soft. Charlie whipped everybody together [ Some cast members tried to pick up technique from anyone with a whiff of expertise. At the time, Benny Urquidez — we called him Benny the Jet — was our trainer. Every day, I'd go to Benny and ask if he could teach me this kata. Every day he'd say, let's think about it.
Turns out he didn't do swords either. He's a fighter. I was literally an hour away from filming this thing. I was shitting bricks. I grabbed a Thai extra. I'd heard he knew sword fighting. He taught me the kata in about an hour. You see this flourish in the film. The movement stands at the crossroads of martial arts and physical comedy. You might call it controlled flailing. At points, the only person who kept it together was the one person who had the best excuse to be falling apart.
He was very good to work with. He wasn't afraid to do the stuff I had for him, swinging on wires and stuff like that. I had doubles, naturally, at times, but he was willing to do anything. While the production allotted Julia time to rest — front loading the schedule with fight scenes — a handful of action sequences featuring the ailing actor were shot later in production.
I had to swing him across the stage to the next catwalk, to face off with Van Damme. I had to swing him a good 60, 70 feet across. It was a long, long swing. He's up on the catwalk and I'm down below. He's maybe 40 feet up. He's got cables on. I'm waiting for [Julia] to get up on the railing to make this move before we roll the cameras. And I'm saying down below to one of the guys, what is [Julia] waiting for?
But he finally got up there and he did it. It was something. He also confessed to having an extramarital affair with co-star Kylie Minogue. Yes, yes, yes. It happened. I was in Thailand, we had an affair. Sweet kiss, beautiful lovemaking. It would be abnormal not to have had an affair, she's so beautiful and she was there in front of me every day with a beautiful smile, simpatico, so charming, she wasn't acting like a big star. I knew Thailand very well, so I showed her my Thailand. She's a great lady.
Years later, Jean-Claude Van Damme admitted he had a serious drug problem while filming. According to de Souza, the action star had a guy, an enforcer type, to ensure the actor be on his best behavior. That guy apparently wasn't so hot at his job, often incorporating himself into the nightly tomfoolery. He said he's sick. Actually he was wiped, recovering from the night before. I would have to just make up some shit on the spot because I didn't have him. We'd invent some kind of fight involving Ken and Ryu and a security guard.
But it was never rehearsed. It was made up on the spot. I was constantly pulling things out of my ass for the supporting players to do while Jean-Claude was playing hooky. Before production began, de Souza fretted Van Damme wouldn't receive enough screen time, which rapidly divided between the numerous character additions ordered by Capcom. Van Damme's transgressions and absence mutated fret into fear into full-on freak-out.
Things were no less difficult with Van Damme on set. De Souza had previously worked with Arnold Schwarzenegger, another famous action star who spoke English as a second language. As a writer, de Souza ran lines with Schwarzenegger before filming, so that difficult phrases could be rewritten.
When de Souza pitched doing the same with Van Damme, the actor claimed to have already run lines with his wife. De Souza laughs as he recalls one complicated action scene in which Van Damme had to deliver a few lines. The scene, set in a big industrial room, involved a number of extras, guns and blood packs and squibs — which, when combined, spit red goo from an actor's costume to simulate a bullet's impact.
For those watching at home, it's the scene where he jumps out of the mutation chamber. Van Damme is shooting guns, causing all sorts of mayhem, and he shouts to Chun-Li and Balrog: "Go, go, I'll catch you later. It's unusual for an actor to call cut; that's the director's role, but Van Damme was sure he'd said "ladder" instead of "later" and he demanded they do it over. De Souza, stunned, noted the crew would need to rematch the bullet holes, rerig the actors who fell from catwalks back on their wires, clean off the costume and replace the blood packs.
But Van Damme ordered another take. While the crew reset everything, Van Damme listened to the audio and realized he'd had it right. De Souza — vindicated, albeit after losing time and resources — decided to shoot the scene again for backup.
Van Damme got in position. De Souza called action. Initially, de Souza's production team had planned a nearly two-month shoot, starting with five weeks of on-location and soundstage work in Bangkok and wrapping with a few weeks of major set-pieces and additional stunt coverage on the famed Australian soundstage, the Gold Coast. While Jean-Claude Van Damme was trouble on the set of the Street Fighter movie, he was not the only problem that plagued the production.
Because of budgeting issues, the other actors weren't trained for the fighting scenes often until the day of the scene, which was potentially hazardous. Additionally, if the studio was giving Steven de Souza a hard time about the length of the shoot, he'd simply pick a page at random out of the script and tear it out. You can read more about the fascinating tale behind getting Street Fighter to the big screen over at The Guardian.
Writer for Movieweb since Enjoys playing Catan when not writing about superheroes and Star Wars. Director Steven E. The studio had hired a wrangler to keep an eye on van Damme, but this person was a bad influence himself.
The action star would often call in sick, leave the set, show up late or not at all, forcing de Souza to find other scenes to film in order to make up for lost time. According to cast and crew, Jean-Claude Van Damme was not easy to work with, due to a combination of professional ego and substance abuse. Being the biggest star on the film, van Damme got a presidential hotel suite with a gym put into his room, but he would often refuse to come out of the hotel or his trailer until he felt ready.
When he did come out, he would often bring alcohol to the set, or take hours to shoot his scenes. By contrast, everyone loved Kylie Minogue , praising her for her professionalism and generosity, such as hiring a club and buying drinks for the entire cast and crew to make the tough shoot a little easier.
There was equal praise for Raul Julia , who was accompanied by his family due to being terminally ill with stomach cancer; despite his declining health and frail state, everyone thought that Julia was always focused, and was a joy to work with. This film was dedicated to Raul Julia , who died soon after filming was complete. For the role of M.
Bison, Raul Julia researched various dictators and crime lords and their lives and personalities, and mimicked many of their traits to incorporate into the M. Bison character notably Benito Mussolini's hand gestures, Joseph Stalin's mannerisms, Pablo Escobar and his elusiveness and Adolf Hitler's love of art.
Julia also approached the role with a Shakespearean tone, looking at Bison in the same type of villain as Richard III. The final scene of all the characters is a real-life recreation of an animation from the video game, where all the characters are on screen at the same time, and do their "win" animation.
The gold statue in Sagat's business parlor the reclining Buddha is the same statue that can be seen in Sagat's backdrop in the video games. Although the film was panned by both movie-critics and fans of the Street Fighter games, it did become a commercial success. Raul Julia 's performance was also praised.
Raul Julia accepted the role of M. Bison because his children were fans of the Street Fighter games, and he wanted to participate in a film that he thought they would enjoy with him.
He even gives a variation of his signature sign-on phrase: "Good morning, Shadoloo! The cast's physical training was handled by Hollywood trainer and world karate champion Benny Urquidez.
Charlie Picerni was hired as the stunt coordinator; he took the job on the condition that he would get ample time to train the cast. De Souza agreed, however there were problems because Urquidez had no experience with video game fighting, so it was found out midway through the shoot that different characters should have different fighting styles.
More complications arose once it was learned that Raul Julia was suffering from cancer. Initially, plans were to shoot Julia's less intensive scenes first while the rest of the cast would rehearse with Picerni, however upon seeing Julia, de Souza realized that they could not show him in his current weakened state, and was forced to switch the filming around.
This led to situations where the cast would be trained only moments before filming their scenes. For example, Byron Mann Ryu didn't hear of his knife fight with Vega until a few hours beforehand, so he asked a Thai stunt man to train him on the spot. The real fight was done with a real blade, so Mann could have been seriously injured if he had not performed his choreography correctly.
The final amphibious attack on M. Bison's compound, filmed on location in Thailand, was originally supposed to be an air assault. The Thai government wouldn't allow the use of its airspace for the large number of aircraft the scene would require, so the producers changed the final battle to a boat assault instead.
There is an oil painting in Bison's private quarters of a frowning clown holding a cluster of balloons and wearing Bison's signature cap. This is a reference to the famous "Pogo the Clown" oil paintings done by the infamous serial killer John Wayne Gacy. He would've been the only original cast member to reprise the role for the Street Fighter reboot.
Van Damme turned down their offer. When Dhalsim is showing Bison his progress on Blanka, the footage on a monitor of a man being shot in the head was real historic footage from World War II. This was Raul Julia 's last theatrical movie. The translation from Spanish is "go with God". The controls to M. Bison's floating desk are video game controls.
Guile is a U. Army colonel in the film. According to Steven E. Capcom was co-financier of the film, so every aspect of production required their approval. Among other things, they mandated a December release date, which required the cast and crew to maintain an aggressive filming schedule. After Raul Julia was cast as Bison, most of the casting budget had been spent. The majority of other parts had to go to little-known or unknown actors.
Ming-Na Wen Chun-Li said that she cringed after seeing the finished film for the first time, and told her ER co-star George Clooney that she feared her career would be over. Clooney casually remarked "Oh honey, it takes a lot to kill a career - I should know". Wen said that she was able to look at the film with fond memories much later. Before the shoot, Raul Julia had undergone surgery for stomach cancer; the illness would take his life within the year.
Rated PG for non-stop martial arts and action violence. Did you know Edit. The studio had hired a wrangler to keep an eye on van Damme, but this person was a bad influence himself. The action star would often call in sick, leave the set, show up late or not at all, forcing de Souza to find other scenes to film in order to make up for lost time.
Goofs When Chun-li says Bison's ammunitions are about to be blown "sky high" her lips don't match her words. Quotes Chun Li : [to Bison] It was twenty years ago. Crazy credits There is a scene after the closing credits: M. Bison is revived by his computer and restarts his plans for world domination. Alternate versions The title sequence is different, depending whether you watch the International version distributed by Columbia, the Street Fighter logo just appears after the Columbia lettering or the US version distributed by Universal, the Street Fighter logo appears over the Universal globe.
Connections Featured in Violence and the Censors User reviews Review. Top review. A weird, horrible movie. I have always been a huge fan of the Street Fighter series in video games. So when this movie came out I was really excited, of course I was way too young to appreciate a movie, but I can tell that back then I thought it was horrible.
A few years ago it was aired on TV and I don't why I saw it again. And I found it kind of funny. The story is all twisted if it gets compared with the video games story; I mean, in the video game, Ryu is the most important character and in the movie it is hardly seen. Cammy is a creation of Bison in the video game , so she is part of the bad guys, while in the movie she is friend of Guile.
A lot of intentional mistakes were made in order to transform what could be a good story into a useless-action-movie. I hoped to see hadoukens and spinning kicks when I first saw the movie, but there is nothing of that.
In other words, the movie sucks. PS: Kylie Minogue, who played Cammy in the movie, declared later that she was completely sorry of shooting such a bad movie. FAQ 2. Why is Doctor Dhalsim baldheaded at the end of the movie? Details Edit. Release date December 23, United States.
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