How the Street Fighter Movie Built Character-Specific Fights

According to Ken actor Noah Centineo, stunt coordinator John Valera researched the Street Fighter characters and the fighting styles associated with their battles to shape the film’s action. Director Kitao Sakurai says he and Valera developed the fights through several rounds of storyboarding, giving each sequence its own visual idea and narrative purpose. The reported “almost 150” refers to the wider game roster Centineo described—not the film’s character count.

What “every character” means

Centineo said the franchise’s characters have different backgrounds and fighting styles, and that Valera researched each character and the fights they appear in. He also said the film carries over signature moves from the games. This is Centineo’s account of Valera’s preparation, not an independently audited production record. GamesRadar+’s interview with Centineo is the source for the claim.

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Centineo’s reference to “almost 150 characters” describes the broader Street Fighter character pool in his remarks. It should not be read as saying that all those characters appear in the movie.

How the fights were designed

Sakurai describes a collaborative process with Valera that began at the storyboarding stage and continued across several stages. They considered each fight’s visual concept and its reason for being in the story, rather than treating the action as interchangeable choreography. In a Cineplay interview, Sakurai put the design goal simply: “Each fight also had to be different.”

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The process involved translating selected game techniques and visual references into live-action sequences. Sakurai named E. Honda’s steam-room fight as the first major fight they shot and his personal favorite, describing its visuals as connected to the spirit of the game and the characters’ emotional state. He also discussed the multi-stage storyboarding approach in an Esquire Philippines interview.

How actors and the stunt team adapted game moves

Callina Liang’s Chun-Li preparation

Callina Liang said she recorded Chun-Li’s moves from Street Fighter gameplay in slow motion to study their mechanics. GamesRadar reported that her preparation included two hours a day of Taekwondo, Muay Thai, and wushu training; Liang described Chun-Li as focused on kicks. These are accounts of her preparation, not independently verified training records. GamesRadar+’s interview with Liang covers her gameplay study and training.

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In a separate Omelete interview, Liang said the movie used a range of fighting styles and retained character-specific kicks and moves. She mentioned elements associated with characters such as Chun-Li’s nunchucks and Vega’s claws.

Rigging, practical effects, and visual effects

Valera told The Game that the action team included martial artists with backgrounds ranging from wushu to boxing. For Chun-Li’s spinning bird kick, a Cirque du Soleil performer helped with harnesses and rigs to sustain the airborne movement. Valera also described working with special-effects and visual-effects teams: explosions and breakaways were safety-tested, while visual effects were used when a human performer could not safely or practically execute an action. His account is in The Game’s interview with Valera.

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That combination reflects the central practical challenge: preserve the moves and styles that make a character recognizable, while adapting them for performers, equipment, and safety. The interviews describe the production’s aims and methods; they do not independently establish how successfully the finished scenes achieve them.

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