The Karate Kid
Jaden Smith, Taraji P. Henson, Rongguang Yu, Zhiheng Wang, Jared Minns, Yi Zhao,
This post is a review and may contain spoilers. Read at your own risk.
The EP is in Kenpo as most of my Twitter readers are aware. Because she is doing so extraordinarily well, the sensei decided that she would perform at the Kenpo demonstration being done at the movie theater for the opening of Jaden Smith’s movie, The karate Kid.
She did a really good job, as always; and her reward from the Sensei was a free movie ticket to see said Karate Kid movie. Brandg and I accompanied her.
The rating is PG due to the violence inherent in such Karate-esque/Kung-fu movies. However, I don’t recall seeing any blood or gore beyond a bloody nose or a bruised knee. So for my parent readers, I think it is a fairly tame movie.
The movie has a very real or at the very least slightly grainy feel to it in parts. They are definitely going for a much more life like look and the director, Harald Zwart, succeeded admirably.
My IMDB plug-in1 failed to mention that this movie stars the wonderfully talented Jackie Chan. It was very odd seeing him playing an ‘old guy’, but he was extremely believable even in the moments we discover the tragedy in his past.
If you are expecting to see him play ‘Mr. Miagi’, you are going to be disappointed. Chan plays maintenance man, Mr. Han, to a lodging building for foreign nationals that have moved to Beijing for work reasons.
Jaden Smith does an excellent job in this film and adds his voice to the new song “Never Say Never”2. His character, Dre Parker, is a tween recently moved from Detroit due to his mother’s job transfer. He meets with all the expected challenges: new school, new friends, new life, new bullies. However, he comes off as mouthy and very pushy at the beginning.
Dre’s mother, Sherry Parker, played by the very talented Taraji P. Henson, does an admirable job of keeping house and home moving despite the loss of her husband. Her son is an overall good kid, but she deals with some real attitude struggles as he begins digging in his heels over acclimating to the move.
I think my favorite part of the mother/son dynamic in this movie was the realism. She was no pushover. And you could see that in her face. She had the “Mom” look down and was not afraid to use it. Too often in movies we see milk-sop mums that are just trying to keep the peace and make everything and everyone happy. It was so refreshing to see that real mums do get mad and that Hollywood is finally accepting the fact that family life isn’t always sweetness and light.
The writers, in their wisdom, have changed both the character names, setting, and overall storyline from The Karate Kid that you and I grew up with. There are many nods to the original however, from the fly-swatter scene [used in the trailer] to the unorthodox training methods in Mr. Han’s back yard.
Anyone familiar with the original Karate Kid will be familiar with the trope of underdog makes good. However, this film goes out of its way to make sure our hero is really beaten down before he gets his chance to fight. When the penultimate fight seen does finally take place, Smith is forced to go through a very emotional scene.
I think he did the best he could, but there was a lot missing from that particular bit of his performance which comes mainly from the fact that he is an obviously well-loved and well-cared for little boy. And boy were his parents all over this movie.
Jada Pinkett Smith (producer) and Will Smith (producer) have raised a very talented young man, and their care and concern was only part of what came through in the film. Every time Jaden had to deliver a comic line Brandg and I were looking at each other. It was like watching Will Smith as a child. And he pulled it off with aplomb.
At the end of the film, while the credits are rolling, the audience is treated to lots of behind the scenes stills. His mother and father are in almost every shot working hard to make this a success for their son. I came away with a real respect for them as parents more than actors, and would like to at this point say thank you to them for setting a real example in the film industry for how child actors should be cared for.
My overall take on this remake is that it is one of the better ones I’ve seen. I think that looking for a sequel is going to be hard to do because of how so many of the original plotlines have been asked and answered in this single film.
For a summer block-buster, I expect it do fairly well even though the IMDB rating is hovering at around 5.3. Rotten Tomatoes however has it at a whopping 70%, which is excellent. Most of the critics agree that this is not the original and as such their expectations were exceeded.
If you do go with the expectation of seeing a word for word remake, it just isn’t going to be there and you will be disappointed. If you go to see Kung-fu and a bully get his ass kicked, there is no way you will be unhappy with supporting your local theater.
My rating: 4 out of 5.
My final opinion: Go see it. Take the kids even.
