“Sweep the leg, Johnny.”
With those four simple words, 1984’s The Karate Kid became the stuff of classic cinema. Naturally, as Hollywood does, they decided to reinvent this beloved film. (Okay, beloved by me, maybe.) And with executive producers Will Smith and his wife driving the bus, the new film is a vehicle for their soon-to-be-bankable-star Jaden.
O’ Ralph Macchio! Where art thou?
The updated Karate Kid changes locations, trades out a few characters and gives a bit more time to the mother-son relationship, but ultimately, this is the same story as the 1984 version. Mother (the always-wonderful Taraji P. Henson) and son Dre (yes, Jaden Smith) move to a strange place (China) in search of a promising new life. Things don’t go well for Dre (read: he gets his ass kicked eight ways to Sunday), and he discovers that the maintenance man (Jackie Chan) in the apartment building knows kung fu. And you can fill in the beats from there.
Smith (Jaden, not Will, though the apple clearly doesn’t fall far from the Fresh Prince) does a good, if not great, job of filling the shoes of Ralph Macchio. (I don’t think those words have ever been spoken.) He certainly has his father’s talent for timing, and his scenes with Chan give the film it’s most powerful moments. And Smith, even as young as he is, brings a real athleticism to the role. What’s missing is…well…acting chops. Young Smith just doesn’t have them yet. The script asks too much of him, and while he delivers in many ways, there are scenes were he’s clearly out of his depth.
The rest of the cast is certainly solid, but the script only gives them enough to tick off the plot boxes. Love interest? Check. Pure evil antagonist kid? Check. Dark overlord slash Cobra Kai dojo master? Check. All the pieces from the original are here, but they’re only that…pieces. They don’t give the film any real power or emotion, because we don’t really feel any kind of connection to them. Again, this isn’t a knock against them as much as it is against director Harald Zwart and the team of Smith’s behind the film. (Sure, there were writers, but I’d imagine they were nothing but puppets to the aforementioned masters.)
And a meaningless rhetorical question here, but what in the hell kind of job does Taraji P. Henson have that moves her from Detroit (Rock City) to Beijing (Forbidden City)? It’s one of those plot points that just sticks in my head but never gets answered. Anyway…
Let’s talk about violence, specifically kids kicking ass and getting their asses kicked. Many have decried the amount of violence in The Karate Kid, and there is a lot of bone-crushing hitting going on. What gets me isn’t the sheer amount of it, but the way some adults (instructors) encourage and enable it, and others (parents) sit by and cheer it. When Macchio got his leg “swept” in the first Karate Kid, it felt real enough. We didn’t need to hear the Joe Theismann-esque bone snapping to get the point. When 11-year-old Jaden Smith, who looks just old enough to finally get to ride the roller coaster at Adventureland, takes multiple kicks to the knee, gut and face, well, you have to wonder where the f*ck his mother is, and why she doesn’t do something.
When it’s not too busy being a vehicle for Jaden Smith to ape his dad’s style, The Karate Kid entertains. When director Harald Zwart focuses more on the relationship between Chan and Smith and less on shooting a China tourism commercial, the film moves and flows. But there just isn’t enough substance to fit the bloated running time (over two hours).
This new Karate Kid is solid family entertainment, sure. But even with the energy of Smith and the quiet confidence of Chan, it lacks the freshness and heart of the original. Add up all the polish and gloss Hollywood can muster in this remake, and it still doesn’t come close to equaling what Ralph Macchio and Pat Morita could deliver twenty-five years ago, with zero special effects and a much smaller budget.
