I went to see the new Karate Kid film a few days ago. I was looking forward to this, partly because it was a karate club outing and thus very social; and partly because I'm a big Jackie Chan fan. I generally like his films because of the combination of comedy and action. The fight scenes are generally well choreographed and exciting but without taking itself too seriously. That's generally what I like about Jackie Chan films.
The Karate Kid is different. The Karate Kid is a disappointment. The Karate Kid made for uncomfortable viewing at times - especially for a parent.
Okay, young Jaden Smith has shown himself to be a very promising actor; the cinematography was impressive, the fight scenes were well choreographed, it had some humour in it, but....
The script writing was lazy and cliched. Small, vulnerable boy from single parent family moves to a strange land and is bullied at school. He is saved from a severe (kung fu) beating from his bullies and their big mates by a maintenance man who also happens to be a kung fu expert. He feels sorry for the kid and agrees to train him in kung fu so that he can avenge his bullies in a kung fu tournament. He trains the kid in about 4 weeks (wow! is kung fu that easy?) by spending most of that time making the kid pick his jacket up and throw it down again (teaches discipline and respect!). He then takes the kid up a mountain to witness acts of Eastern mysticism. The kid is now a kung fu prodigy, attends the bad tempered tournament for his grudge match and guess what? He gets his butt kicked in but bravely makes it back into the arena (with possible broken leg) and wins! Oh, forgot the little side story love interest between the boy and a (proverbial)Chinese girl music prodigy, with pushy, high achieving parents.
Pleeaasseee! I know it's a re-make and all that but there is not an original thought in this film (or any karate).
However, my real dislike of this film is not to do with the poor script and all the cliches - it's to do with the violence. It made very uncomfortable viewing to watch children venting such hatred towards each other and participating in full contact violent kung fu fighting. The little kid (Dre) would have been dead within about 2 minutes if this was real but no, his broken ribs and bruising were healed miraculously and instantly by the maintenance man using 'fire cups' and his black eye was completely healed after about 2 days. The kung fu bullies didn't seem to get a scratch on them despite the maintenance man's best efforts to virtually kill them!
The last straw for me though was the tournament at the end. Think bear baiting, think baying crowds, think gladiatorial fights to the death - this was the tone of a martial arts tournament for kids! It made me think of cage fighting - but at least that is between consenting adults and obeys fairly strict rules. Young Dre had not consented to this fight - he was entered into it by the maintenance man who seemed to have a grudge against the kung fu bullies evil instructor. The crowd (of mainly adults) were cheering every time a kid severely hit another kid or did a spinning kick into their head. It was brutal, it was gratuitous, it was shameful behaviour by both contestants and the audience at a martial arts tournament for kids. Dre's mum was the worst. She jumped up and down cheering every time her son landed some pretty serious 'death strikes' on his opponent and was disappointed when Dre got thrown right out of the fighting area landing heavily on his back (she didn't seem concerned that he might be dead!).
In my opinion, this film glorified violence between children. Children who were basically porns in a feud between adults. They tried to redeem this slightly by the team of kung fu bullies bowing to Dre at the end to show 'respect' but unfortunately this was the type of 'respect' culture one sees in street gangs!
I did not like this film (as you can probably tell). In the UK it has a PG certificate (Parental Guidance) which means any kid can go and see it if their parents let them. Several younger children in the cinema watched the fight scenes through their fingers and were clearly unhappy when they came out. This film should have had a minimum 12 certificate.
I am hard pressed to find any positive values that children would take home after watching this film. Have you watched it? What did you think?
29th August 2010: since writing this post I have visited Sensei Matt Klein's blog where he has several posts about the Karate Kid film, painting it in a much more positive light than me. So for a sense of balance please visit his blog at: http://karate-kids.com.au/10-lessons-learned-from-the-karate-kid-movie/
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