ADMIT ONE · Round Two · Seat: Player 2 Side
As of October 21, 2026, Street Fighter is coming off a No. 1 weekend (Oct. 16–18) worth $30.8 million (Box Office Mojo). In Kitao Sakurai's version, Chun-Li (Callina Liang) recruits Ryu (Andrew Koji) and Ken Masters (Noah Centineo) for the World Warrior tournament so they can get to M. Bison. Ryu and Ken are adoptive brothers who drifted apart after Ryu vanished from the fighting world (Wikipedia)). Jason Momoa plays Blanka, and 50 Cent plays Balrog. As of October 21, 2026, reviews have been mixed (Wikipedia)).
If the walk out of the theater left you itching for another bracket, the 12 martial arts movies below bring the tournaments, the grudges and the moves that shouldn't be physically possible. Two video-game cousins wait at the bottom.
Heads up: every pick below is on goodrecmovies, and every one in the main list is a martial arts movie. Two non-martial-arts cousins get their own labeled spot at the bottom. No spoilers past each film's setup.
Tear the stub: martial arts movies like Street Fighter
Start at the source. The Street Fighter games were inspired by this one: an international fighting tournament where every fighter brings a different nationality and fighting style (Wikipedia). Bruce Lee plays a Shaolin martial artist that British intelligence sends to the private island of Han, a suspected crime lord who hosts a tournament for fighters from around the world (Wikipedia). It was Lee's final completed film.
A fighting-game adaptation we do have in the catalog. Two stories run side by side. Hanzo Hasashi comes back from the Netherrealm as Scorpion, out for revenge on Sub-Zero, who killed his son. Meanwhile Liu Kang, Johnny Cage and Sonya Blade head to Shang Tsung's island for the Mortal Kombat tournament (Wikipedia). Heads up: this is adult animation with heavy, bloody fight violence. Grown-ups only.
Scott Adkins plays Yuri Boyka, a fallen fighter now working as a prison janitor, who hears about an inter-prison fighting tournament that offers a shot at early release. He ends up at a prison in Georgia alongside fighters from around the world, then finds out the tournament is fixed (Wikipedia). A rigged bracket with a villain cashing in on it is Bison's whole business model. Heads up: hard-hitting prison fight violence.
Jet Li plays Huo Yuanjia, a real Chinese martial artist who took on foreign fighters in high-profile matches in the final years of the Qing dynasty. The film opens in 1910 at an international tournament in Shanghai, with Huo three challengers down and one to go, then flashes back to how he got there (Wikipedia)). Li said it was his last wushu martial arts film. Subtitled.
Thieves from Bangkok steal the head of a village's Buddha statue, and Ting (Tony Jaa), a Muay Thai expert, goes to the city to bring it back. His cousin bets Ting's money on an underground fight in a bar on Khaosan Road, so Ting gets it back by knocking out the champion (Wikipedia). It was Jaa's breakout. Subtitled.
Donnie Yen plays the Wing Chun grandmaster who later taught Bruce Lee. In Japanese-occupied Foshan, General Miura, a karate master, runs an arena where Chinese martial artists fight his trainees for a bag of rice. Ip asks to fight ten of them at once (Wikipedia)). Subtitled.
Ip Man 2 (2010) is the sequel, where Ip faces British boxing champion Taylor "The Twister" Miller (Wikipedia).
Tom Hardy and Joel Edgerton play estranged brothers who both enter Sparta, a mixed martial arts tournament with a $5 million prize pool, for very different reasons (Wikipedia)). The fights are cage fights, with no fireballs. Their father, Paddy, is a recovering alcoholic trying to convince his sons he's changed. If the Ryu and Ken story was the part that landed for you, this is the pick.
Daniel LaRusso (Ralph Macchio) moves to Reseda, gets beaten up by Cobra Kai's Johnny Lawrence, and gets the apartment handyman, Mr. Miyagi (Pat Morita), to teach him karate. The deal: Daniel competes in the All-Valley Karate Championships, and the bullying stops while he trains. Miyagi trains him through chores around the house (Wikipedia)), and the whole thing builds to a tournament bracket.
For Street Fighter's sillier side. In 1940s Shanghai, small-time crook Sing tries to shake down the residents of Pigsty Alley by pretending to be in the Axe Gang, and it turns out some of the tenants are kung fu masters (Wikipedia). Stephen Chow directs and stars, Yuen Woo-ping supervised the fights. The moves get Hadouken-wild. One fighter stops a bullet in midair, and Sing's big move is a Buddhist Palm technique from a pamphlet he bought as a kid (Wikipedia). Subtitled.
Jackie Chan plays folk hero Wong Fei-hung. A mix-up on the way home to Canton leaves him holding an imperial seal the British consul is trying to smuggle out of China, and getting drunk to fight in public lands him in trouble with his father (Wikipedia). For Chun-Li fans, Callina Liang trained in Taekwondo, Muay Thai and Wushu for the role (Wikipedia)), and this film's final fight pits Wong's drunken boxing against Ken Lo's Taekwondo kicks. Released in North America as The Legend of Drunken Master. Subtitled.
The Marvel pick, and its fights run on kung fu. Shang-Chi (Simu Liu) was put through brutal martial arts training as a kid by his father, Wenwu (Tony Leung), who wields the mystical ten rings. Years later he's a parking valet in San Francisco, gets attacked on a bus, and tracks his sister Xialing to the secret fight club she runs in Macau (Wikipedia). For the role, Liu trained in tai chi, wushu, Muay Thai, silat and street fighting (Wikipedia).
Rookie cop Rama (Iko Uwais) joins a 20-man squad raiding a crime lord's apartment block in the slums of Jakarta. They get spotted on the sixth floor, the building turns on them, and they have to fight their way out (Wikipedia)). It's built around the Indonesian martial art pencak silat. Heads up: the violence is intense and bloody, so skip it if you're squeamish. Subtitled.
The Raid 2 (2014) is the sequel, and it's on the site too.
Not martial arts movies, but they speak fighting game
Disney animation with the actual Street Fighter crew on screen. Ryu, Ken Masters, M. Bison and Zangief all cameo (Wikipedia). Ralph, the villain of an arcade game, is sick of his role and sneaks into another game to win a medal. The family-friendly pick.
A romantic action comedy where every fight plays like a boss level. Slacker bassist Scott (Michael Cera) has to defeat the seven evil exes of his new girlfriend, Ramona Flowers (Mary Elizabeth Winstead), and Edgar Wright borrows the look of manga and 16-bit video games to do it (Wikipedia).
Not on goodrecmovies yet: Street Fighter (1994), Street Fighter II: The Animated Movie (1994), Mortal Kombat (1995), Mortal Kombat (2021), Bloodsport (1988), Kickboxer (1989) and Tekken (2010) aren't in our catalog, so they aren't linked here.
Pick your fighter, then rate a few movies on goodrecmovies and get your next rec lined up before the credits roll.