The cast’s joking rendition of The Weather Girls’ “It’s Raining Men” became Street Fighter’s closing song after director Kitao Sakurai saw that it worked. The song was settled late in the editing process.
In a video interview with Polygon, Sakurai said the team couldn’t settle on music for the post-climax scene. They found their solution in a take recorded for fun.
“It was pretty late into the editorial process where [we were] trying to find the right song, but nothing was really clicking,” Sakurai said. “We had a take where [the cast] just started singing ‘It’s Raining Men’ as a joke just to try something and as a fun thing to do. I looked at it, and we set it to music, and I was like, This is kind of incredible. [laughs] Like, it just works. Also, the interaction between Ken and Ryu in that moment is just so sincere and so real, it’s such a perfectly weird and stupid choice to end the movie on that it felt just right.”
For Sakurai, the ridiculous song fit because the Ken and Ryu exchange it plays over is so honest, and he welcomed that contrast.
“The thesis of our style of the movie is just being like, ‘Fuck it, man,'” Sakurai added. “The Weather Girls? Why not? But it emotionally works, you know?”
There are other unexpected selections on the soundtrack for Capcom and Legendary’s movie. According to Polygon’s coverage of Street Fighter, much of the music comes from the 1990s, the decade in which the story takes place. The songs include Tupac’s “Ambitionz Az A Ridah,” Soundgarden’s “Black Hole Sun,” and Meredith Brooks’ “Bitch,” but the film also draws from outside those years.
One example is “Many Men (Wish Death)” by 50 Cent, heard in a fight involving boxer Balrog. The pairing makes sense, since 50 Cent also plays Balrog, though Polygon says the song feels temporally out of place.
A different ’90s earworm plays a more direct part in the story: 4 Non Blondes’ “What’s Up?” has a surprisingly important role in Ken and Ryu’s journey. Polygon sees the final song differently, describing the choice of one-hit wonder The Weather Girls’ “It’s Raining Men” as seemingly random, sending viewers out on a confusing but high-spirited note.
Street Fighter is now playing in movie theaters.
