film review: the karate kid
Harald Zwart’s updated version of The Karate Kid will please younger audiences as it mixes action, comedy and romance, and it should bring a sense of nostalgia for older viewers (as the plot is fairly consistent with the 1980s version). Jaden Smith steals the spotlight as the lonely, but very charismatic Dre; and the sweeping shots of the landscape surrounding the Great Wall of China (such as the lush forests, waterfalls and snow-capped mountains) are certainly appreciated. Overall however, the film does not live up to the original, partly due to the excessive run time of two and half hours.
The film follows Dre (Jaden Smith) who is forced to move to China with his mother who has been transferred there for work. He instantly makes enemies with the school bullies who are all experts at Kung Fu, but with the help of his only friend, the older maintenance man Mr Hun (Jackie Chan), he enters a Kung Fu tournament to “make peace” with them. Dre’s training sessions provide the bulk of the film, but his developing romance with Cheng (Wang Zhenwei) an aspiring violinist, also takes up a fair amount of screen time.
Produced by the parents of the lead character (Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith), the new Karate Kid has sparked some recent controversy in Australia regarding its rating, due to the frequent occurrences of stylised violence at the hands of children. Child psychologist Glenn Cupit described the film’s violence as “quite brutal and of an adult type” and The Australian Council on Children and the Media believe the film should have been given an M, instead of the PG rating (cited on the ABC website, accessed July, 2010). By the end of the film, however, Mr Hun has demonstrated to Dre that “Kung Fu is about knowledge” – not violence, which is perhaps the film’s main message. The themes of the film revolve around the hardships of being bullied and the difficulties of culture shock, but it also provides an insight into some Chinese traditions. For example, one scene shows Mr Hun rubbing flames across Dre’s chest, after he was attacked, which miraculously heals him.
The original film was not designed to be serious, and neither is this one, but if you’re a fan of martial arts maestro Jackie Chan and are in the mood for some stylised fight scenes, then check this film out.
