Good-bye, bad memories of Jean-Claude Van Damme as Guile or that chick from Billy Madison as Sonya (not to mention Kristin Kreuk as Chun-Li). We finally have a gaming character worthy of our praise.
Meet Hugo Park, the unlikely hero of the 20-minute short film Turbo. Some USC graduate students put this movie together for less than $100,000 using a Red One camera. Its storyline beats just about every video game movie that Hollywood’s made.
The basic premise is that Hugo is sort of a “lost kid” who’s only ambition is to beat all opposition in a “virtual reality”-style fighting game called Super Turbo Arena. The effects are actually impressive [via Gizmondo]:
[video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vhNbPdUGnT0 560×340]
According to the film’s website (where you can actually view the entire movie right now), “TURBO is a high-adrenaline short film in the tradition of the Karate Kid and Tron.“ In the words of John Travolta, that’s a bold statement.
Still, compared to its competition in the game-movie arena, it’s slightly better than the 1993 science-fiction adventure movie Super Mario Bros., starring John Leguizamo and Dennis Hopper. Just about the only bad thing about this movie is that its star, Justin Chon, also appeared in Twilight, but that’s not Turbo’s fault.