Super Mario (2022)

Super Mario is a 2022 computer-animated comedy and action film written and directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller based on the popular Super Mario videogame franchise. The movie follows Mario and Luigi, two plumber brothers that live in the Mushroom Kingdom, on an adventure to rescue Peach, the princess of the kingdom, from Bowser. Josh Gad, Owen Wilson, Rashida Jones, Bill Hader and Jemaine Clement provide their voices for the film's main characters.

The film was produced by Nintendo Studios and Illumination and distributed by Illumination, and became a massive success, grossing $754 million worldwide against a budget of $70 million dollars, becoming the most highest-grossing animated film of 2022 and one of the most highest-grossing films of that year. The film also was a critical success, recieving praise for its animation, acting, story, humor and adapting well to the original series.

Plot
Mario and Luigi are two brothers who work as plumbers for the "Spike Plumbing Co." created by greedy boss spike. Mario had always been more populer than luigi which made him sad, and desperate to prove himself hes as good as mario. Mario understands this, and endeavers to help him. One day, while working on a bathtub drain for a customer, the pair acidently warped to the Mushroom Kingdom, a grassy kingdom with lots of houses shaped like mushrooms. Toad, a mushroom creature, sees thier plumbing uniforms, and offers thema job as plumbers for princes peach. Mario, seeing this as an opurtonitey to quit his low-paying job, to help luigi, and due to him falling in love with peach apon meeting her, he accepts the offer. The bros imediately quit working for spike, and move into the mushroom kingdom. The next day, Mario and Luigi go to the Castle to clean it, where Mario gets right to work, singing as he does so. Just then, gigantic pipes start popping up in the basement and in the courtyard. Various enemies from Super Mario World pop out of the pipes and attack the guards, but the Mario Bros. fight back. Bowser comes out of the largest of the pipes in his Koopa Clown Car and proposes marriage to Princess Toadstool. He then leaves her one week to decide on his proposal, but she rallies her troops and takes off after him.

Mario and Luigi chase after The Princess and soon find a large egg, which cracks open to reveal a grateful Yoshi. Mario and Luigi felt afraid, thinking that the Yoshi might eat them, until they found that he is a friendly dinosaur when they saw him eat the Wiggler. Yoshi takes them to the nearby Yoshi Village, and discover Yoshi's backstory. Toad arrives to inform the pair that Toadstool has been captured. Meanwhile, Bowser explains his plan to the koopalings his seven children, and he reveals hes trying to take over the mushroom kingdom, due to "past experiences" with the toads.

Mario, Luigi, yoshi, and toad are then attacked by donkey kong, an old foe of mario who once kidnaped his ex-girlfreind pauline, and donkey kong atemts to get revenge on mario by fighting him. The gang defeats him, and then being captured by a magikoopa. The creature reveals himself as Kamek, bowsers powerful advisor, who boswer sent to defeat the mario bros, and captured them because of that. Mario and Luigi easily beat him up and continue their journey to the Koopa Kingdom.

In a nearby tower surrounded by a lake, the Koopalings are contacted by Bowser, who informs them of his decision to make The Princess their stepmother and then orders the Koopalings to make sure she doesn't escape. She soon does, using a cape she finds that gives her the ability to fly.

On the other side of the lake, the Mario Bros., Toad, and Yoshi are trying to figure out a way to get to the tower. Mario rescues Luigi from a Bullet Bill which takes Mario across the lake. The Princess lands unconscious by Luigi, and Mario lands dazed in the clutches of the Koopalings.

Luigi poses as The Princess, using a mask, and is brought to Bowser. The real Princess wakes up, now dressed as Luigi, and is also determined to rescue Mario. Luigi offers to order the Koopalings a pizza, and then calls up Yoshi and Toad, who show up dressed as pizza delivery boys. But out of the boxes come The Princess bearing a pack of bombs ,as Luigi runs off to rescue his brother. Eventually The Princess's bomb is accidentally lit from the Reznors, blowing up the tower and sending all the good guys flying back over to the other side of the moat.

Mario realises there's no way to reach the entry pipe in the sky. Toad takes The Princess cape to fly up to the pipe and send for a rescue party. Shortly afterward, some odd-looking Mushroomites show up with a rope ladder. The leader cuts the portion of the ladder with the Mario Brothers, and it is revealed that Bowser and the Koopas have taken control of the Mushroom Kingdom and the Princess Was Once again Kidnapped.

The Mario Bros. and Yoshi give chase after the Koopas' saucer, but Bowser responds by sending down Koopa Paratroopas to attack them. Mario fights back and Yoshi eats each Paratroopa until finally he swallows a Blue Koopa Shell and grows wings. The trio eventually crash-land in front of a Ghost House. Luigi dashes into the house, smelling cheese, and Mario follows when a metal door comes down, leaving Yoshi locked out.

Mario and Luigi are surrounded by Boos, eventually meeting Big Boo. They escape through a door and when the Boos follow they find Mario dressed as a psychiatrist, and Luigi as a nurse. Mario consults the Big Boo, who confesses that his fear of humans stems from bad childhood experiences. Now feeling better, the Big Boo and his buddies let Mario and Luigi out of the house and tell them how to get to Bowser's castle. Mario and Luigi run into donkey kong again, and donkey kong tells them that he wants to stop bowser too, and the two decide to help eachother. The gang travels to dks village and dks grampa Cranky tells them the Legend of the Starman, that makes a person invincible and is currently in a "terrible location". However, the Koopas in this village attack Mario and Luigi but they counterattack, with Luigi fighting most of them. After Mario tells cranky that he defeated all the enemies, Luigi gets angry and gets into a discussion with Mario, saying that he is "tired of being Player 2" and they part ways.

Meanwhile in Bowser's castle's prisions, Peach, that is trapped in a cell, asks Toad for her bag. After pulling out lots of things, including a racket, a green mushroom and a frying pan, Peach grabs a yellow parasol and escapes from the cell, defeating several Goomba guards. She then goes to Bowser's throne room and tries to fight him but fails.

After both arrive to the Koopa Kingdom, Mario,dk, and yoshi find luigi, and mario aoligizes to luigi, and they agree to stop fighting and join again to defeat Bowser and save Peach. The Mario Bros. and Yoshi make it to the Koopa-conquered Mushroom Kingdom and find that practically every enemy character from the classic Mario games are gathering for Bowser's marriage. The trio use available pipes, and Mario gets separated from the other two.Bowser uses Magikoopa to hypnotize the Princess into loving him, but just as the ceremony begins, Mario comes out and attacks Bowser. He is astonished to hear Princess Toadstool declaring her apparent love for Bowser, but he refuses to let that stop him, and he attempts to carry her out while Bowser orders his men to seize him.Down in the basement, Luigi and Yoshi come upon the captured Yoshis, who are now all trapped in eggs. They get to work setting the Yoshis free. Mario quickly dashes against Bowser but easily gets pushed away, while Luigi is too scared to fight. Mario,dk,yoshi, and Peach then fight against Bowser but a lot of guards appear and capture them. Luigi then defeats the guards and tells them to go to the cannon and escape to the Mushroom Kingdom while he fights Bowser. Mario hugs his brother and Peach then grabs him from the ear, with both (including Toad) launching into the cannon and landing in Mushroom Kingdom.

Luigi then tries to defeat Bowser with some punches and kicks but fails, with Bowser saying that "he will always be Player 2" Luigi's eyes then focus on the Starman, that was in a cage very close to Bowser's throne. He breaks the cage but kamek comes in and grabs the Starman, becoming invincible for a short time but then exploding in Luigi's face,as the Yoshis come stampeding in, trampling all of Bowser's minions. Luigi then grabs the Starman and does a powerful punch, launching Bowser upwards who then falls into the water.

The castle begins to break apart and Luigi quickly goes into the cannon and launches him to Mushroom Kingdom, then getting hugged by Mario and Peach when they find him. Peach then begins a celebration "to the heroes of the Mushroom Kingdom". The movie ends with a sequence of the day after that, with yoshi reuniting with his family, dk earning respect for mario. Mario and Luigi celebrating the grand opening of "Mario and Luigi Plumbing Co." with both of them walking to the castle alongside Peach.

Cast

 * Chris pratt as Mario: A normal plumber that works with his younger brother Luigi. He begins the adventure to save Peach with his brother and helps him overcome his fears. Mario is brave, self-confident and a bit clumsy.
 * Charlie Day as Luigi: Mario's younger scaredy brother. He also works as a plumber alongside Mario and goes with him on an adventure to save Peach. He gets scared very easily but loves to make new friends.
 * Anya-taylor joy as Princess Peach: The monarch of the Mushroom Kingdom. Through at the beginning she seems shy, she's very brave and intelligent. She also loves scaring Toad.
 * Kegen-Micheal key as Toad: Peach's helper who is perhaps more scaredy than Luigi. He shouts most of the time but always tries to help the princess.
 * Jack Black as Bowser: The Koopa King, Bowser is a scary but lonely person. At the beginning of the movie he explains he only captured Peach because of respect, but becomes more mean-spirited as the movie progresses. He secretly loves singing.
 * Kevin micheal richerdson: as Kamek A little Goomba who wants the respect of Bowser and does very dangerous things for that such as capturing Mario and Luigi or try to use the Starman to become invincible.
 * Morgan Freeman as the Old Koopa: A wise Koopa Troopa with a beard that tells Mario and Luigi about the Legend of the Starman. He then appears at the end of the movie in the Mushroom Kingdom and gives Mario the Fire Flower.
 * Danny DeVito as Piranha Plant: A silly plant who also wants bowsers respect, but at the same time, he says dumb jokes no one likes, and eats Mario and Luigi but never succeeds.
 * Natalie Portman as Toadette: A joyfull and active Toad but as a girl, she apears at the last 3 scenes falling from the sky yelling "Help, i'm falling, heeeeeeeeeeeeeeelp!", then she lands in the Mushroom Kingdoom, wakes up, then Toad was walking and sees her, Toad arrives, Toadette asks "Um, excuse me, where am I?" and Toad says "You're in the Mushroom Kingdoom, what's your name?" then she says "The name's Toadette"

Development
After the critical and commercial failure of the 1993 Super Mario Bros. film adaptation, Japanese video game company Nintendo became wary of licensing its properties for film adaptations. According to Mario creator Shigeru Miyamoto, the idea for a new Mario film came from bringing their older games to the Virtual Console and other services; such transitions took time for the company, and Miyamoto recognized that "our content business would be able to develop even further if we were able to combine our long-beloved software with that of video assets, and utilize them together for extended periods." Miyamoto knew that the process of making a film was far different from that of making a video game, and wanted a film expert to lead the effort.

Following the November 2014 hack of Sony Pictures, emails between producer Avi Arad, studio chief Amy Pascal, TriStar Pictures head Tom Rothman, and Sony Pictures Animation president of production Michelle Raimo Kouyate were released revealing that Sony had been attempting to secure the film rights to the Mario franchise for several years. Arad visited Nintendo in Tokyo in February and July 2014 in an attempt to secure a deal. In October, Arad emailed Pascal and said he had closed the deal with Nintendo. Pascal suggested recruiting Hotel Transylvania director Genndy Tartakovsky to help develop the project, while Kouyate said she could "think of 3–4 movies right out of the gate" and expressed hope in "build[ing] a Mario empire." However, after the emails leaked, Arad denied that a deal had been made, stating that negotiations had only begun. BuzzFeed News noted that the emails did not take into account potential conflicts with Sony Pictures' corporate sibling Sony Interactive Entertainment, one of Nintendo's chief competitors.

Through Nintendo's work with Universal Parks & Resorts to create Mario-based attractions, Miyamoto met Chris Meledandri, founder of Universal Pictures' Illumination animation division. Miyamoto found Meledandri's creative process similar to his own, and felt he would be the proper lead for a Mario film. They had started more earnest discussions by 2016, knowing that if they felt it would not work that they could easily walk away. In November 2017, reports emerged that Nintendo was collaborating with Universal and Illumination to make an animated Mario film. Then-Nintendo president Tatsumi Kimishima clarified that a deal had not been finalized, but that an announcement would come soon. Kimishima hoped that if the deal was successful, a 2020 release date would be possible. In January 2018, Nintendo announced that the film would progress with Miyamoto and Meledandri co-producing. Meledandri said the film was a "priority" for Illumination and that it will most likely come out in 2022. He added that Miyamoto would be "front and center" during production. In January 2020, Nintendo president Shuntaro Furukawa stated that the film was "moving along smoothly" with an expected 2022 release date. Furukawa also said Nintendo would own the rights to the film, and both Nintendo and Universal would fund the production.

In August 2021, it emerged that Aaron Horvath and Michael Jelenic were directing the film after the discovery of an Illumination animator's LinkedIn profile that included the film in their list. Following the full casting announcement, Horvath and Jelenic were confirmed to be directing, with Matthew Fogel attached as the screenwriter.

Casting
In February 2021, Mario voice actor Charles Martinet said the possibility of reprising his role in the film would be "a marvelous thing" and that if he were asked to voice Mario, "I'll go in and play with great joy and happiness." In August 2021, Sebastian Maniscalco revealed he was voicing Spike, Mario and Luigi's boss from the game Wrecking Crew (1985).

During a September 2021 Nintendo Direct presentation, Shigeru Miyamoto announced that Chris Pratt, Anya Taylor-Joy, Charlie Day, Jack Black, Keegan-Michael Key, Seth Rogen, Kevin Michael Richardson, Fred Armisen, and Maniscalco would headline the voice cast, and that Martinet would be featured in "surprise cameos." This announcement was met with a mixed reaction from longtime fans: while some welcomed the idea of celebrity actors voicing the characters, others were highly critical of the choices, in particular Pratt as Mario instead of Martinet (who has voiced the character since 1992) or an Italian actor.

Post-production
The film's total cost was $130 million, including advertising, production and prints.

Franchise
After the commercial and critical success of the movie, Lord and Miller announced that the movie would become a franchise, with a sequel (tentatively named Super Mario Bros) on the works, and a television series starring Jones as Princess Peach airing in Cartoon Network with a tentative 2023 release. In an interview, Chris Columbus showed his interest in directing a Luigi's Mansion movie.