A few friends of mine suggested that it was a decent version, however, and as I'm doing a three part series on remakes, sequels, and reboots on this blog anyhow, I decided to watch it to see where in the spectrum on remakes it may fall. You may now hand me a plate of crow, as this version was not only better than expected, but it was plain out a good movie.
The premise had Dre Parker (Jaden Smith) and his mother (Taraji P Henson) leave Detroit when her job transfers her to Beijing. Dre tries making a few friends and even talks to a pretty girl named Meiying (Wenwen Han), which brings him to the attention of a group of bullies. The leader, Cheng (Zenwie Wang), kicks the snot out of him in the playground and begins bullying him every day after. The building's maintenance man, Mr. Han (Jackie Chan), breaks up one particularly brutal attack, causing the bullies to beat themselves up in a fairly amusing sequence.
Han goes to the Cheng's dojo to try to get the bullies to leave Dre alone. He ends up entering Dre in a tournament and agrees to train Dre in the ways of Kung Fu. The training, involving Dre taking his jacket off, putting it on a hook, taking it off the hook and putting it back on, confuses Dre until it is revealed that all those moves were actually part of the training. The day of the tournament arrives. Cheng's Sifu wants Dre broken. Dre wants to face his fears, win or lose.
This version hits almost every beat of the original. The locations are different and the ages are different, but the story takes much the same track. Ralph Macchio's Daniel was a teenager while Dre is only 12. For some, this is the biggest knock against the movie. I've read a lot of people post that 12 year olds being bullied are no big deal while a high school senior has to defend his manhood. That's complete nonsense. Without knocking the original, I'll put up this much disclosure: I was 12 years old when my family moved and I was bullied by snots just like the ones picking on Dre in my new environment. So guess what? I get this movie. I get it exactly.
The thing that surprises me the most is how much I got into it. I knew where they were going during the tournament, but it still held some suspense. There's even a few nice nods to the original, such as Chan trying to catch a fly with some chopsticks.
As for the cast, they all do a fine job. Quite a few people have grumbled that this was simply a vanity project for Will Smith in casting his son Jaden in it, but the kid does a good job. He's believable for the most part and avoids the stereotype of a whiny kid. As for Chan, he's Jackie Chan and that's all that needs to be said there. You can't take your eyes off him from the moment he shows up. And Wang is so nasty, you can't wait for him to get his.
This movie won't take the place of the original--very few remakes do. Then again, the original was, at the end of the day, your typical underdog sports movie slightly elevated by Pat Morita's memorable Miyagi character. Take him (and Elisabeth Shue in a swimsuit) away and what did you have? Morita made the original movie and Chan makes this one. There is room for two movies called The Karate Kid in this world after all. Who knew?
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