Family Dinner comedy plans 'flawless victory' with Spoof Night screening of 'Mortal Komb

When Robert Rau first saw "Mortal Kombat" at the Siegen 10 cineplex, the then-18-year-old had one thought.

"It was badass," Rau remembered. "It was one of those movies you watch, and you immediately think, 'Yeah, this is great.' ”

Rau isn't alone when reminiscing about the 1995 hit movie. Baton Rougeans will get to relive the guts and glory this weekend when Rau and the Family Dinner comedy troupe tackle the action flick during this weekend's "Spoof Night!" The RiffTrax-style screening starts at 7:30 p.m. Friday at Manship Theatre.

During past "Spoof Night!" screenings, Family Dinner has poked fun at "Die Hard," "Back to the Future" and "Edward Scissorhands." Rau said the key is picking out movies that are nostalgic favorites.

"It's never an actual bad movie," he said. "These are movies that people watched and enjoyed as kids and teenagers, then they grow up, and they're like, 'I remember that.' They come see it again, but this time, they're in a room with other people who also haven't seen it in forever. They get to experience it all over again."

Based on the popular arcade game, "Mortal Kombat" follows three martial artists as they go into a fantasy world, competing in a fighting tournament to save the fate of the world. On a budget of less than $20 million, it went on to gross more than $122 million worldwide. If you want to see one of the few successful examples of a movie based on a video game, this is it.

"('Mortal Kombat') came out at a time when we didn't have good superhero or video game movies," Rau said. "When you're a teenager, you don't know any better. At that time, we didn't have good action films. Rewatching it, this was a lot better than I expected."

To prepare, Rau has already watched the movie 10 times and will watch it another five times to get material down. At first, he was unsure the troupe could pull off any jokes because of all the fight scenes. But quickly, the troupe found the funny.

"Within the first 20 minutes, I was in," he said. "It has so many weird things right from the beginning. The opening credits ... you don't have other movies declaring themselves to you, right from the start, in song."

He started to mock the infamous theme song, yelling "Mortal Kombat" with his fists clenched. Automatically, I started hearing that keyboard riff (duh-nuh duh-nuh duh-nuh duh-nuh nuh-nuh) in my head.

"This movie is silly," he said with a laugh after the brief performance. "From that angle, it has a lot going for it."