While we may look back at the Super Mario Bros. movie through rose-colored glasses, there's no denying that the movie was a bit of a mess. Hell, it wasn't even easy to direct. Director Rocky Morton sat down with SciFi Now (via Polygon) to reflect on the movie and from the sound of it – he didn't have the best experience.
"Tough? That's a very mild word," Morton said when asked about production. "It was a harrowing experience. It was hell."
The entire script that had brought everybody on board for the project wasn't even the script for the film. The film was shot on a script that was written by a new writer who "wrote it in about a week and a half." The new script was so different that Morton nearly walked off of the project along with his co-director Annabel Jankel.
"It was a different script, and the actors were all brought onboard for that script, and then it was completely changed. I had to stand by with the new script, obviously, and tell them that it was great when I knew it wasn’t. They were all saying, ‘Where’s the original script? Where’s the one we liked?’ and we’d have to tell them it’s all new, it’s all new and different now. So everybody was angsty and uppity, and the whole thing was thrown into turmoil because of that one decision."
Even though the new script was filled with continuity errors and working with Dennis Hopper was "extremely" hard, Morton is proud of the work he did with the film.
"You know, we created all those characters — I mean, obviously the characters were created for the video game, but we brought all those to life and we created that world," Morton said. "So I'm proud of that, and I think it was an achievement, but it's a messy film."
Of course, even if it's not great… You should be proud you made it.
