2/5
I saw The Karate Kid at the end of a long night at the drive in. Maybe it was just the sleep deprivation, but I did not like this film. It seems to live off of clichés and it's just way too predictable.
Jaden Smith plays Dre, a boy who moves to China with his mom after his father passes away. In China Dre has problems fitting in and on his first day he gets into a fight with a local, who kicks his ass. Dre then decides he should learn Kung-fu (I'm not quite sure why he learns kung-Fu in the 'karate' kid). When he is attacked again, his building handyman (Jackie Chan) comes to his aid. After that the older man decides to tutor Dre in the art kung-Fu.
The rest is pretty basic, Dre practices Kung-Fu so that he can fight
against the bully in a local competition. The story is basically the
same as the original version, the only differences are that the boy
moves to China instead of California, the boy is much younger and
instead of wax on, wax off, it has become jacket on, jacket off.
The acting is fine in The Karate Kid. Jaden Smith is fine, but he
doesn't have a very good script to work with. Jackie Chan is not as
good as expected, I much preferred Mr. Myagi from the original over Chan's new character (Mr. Han). Jackie Chan does not have the same sort of quite mystery, where you wonder if he is stupid or brilliant.
Although The Karate Kid has some entertaining scenes, it is, in general, not a good movie. The script is too predictable, the main character is too young and there are too many clichés, so instead of being a great classic, it becomes an afterthought in the history of underdog sports movie, lost far, far behind giants like Remember the Titans, Rudy and A League of Their Own.
I saw The Karate Kid at the end of a long night at the drive in. Maybe it was just the sleep deprivation, but I did not like this film. It seems to live off of clichés and it's just way too predictable.
Jaden Smith plays Dre, a boy who moves to China with his mom after his father passes away. In China Dre has problems fitting in and on his first day he gets into a fight with a local, who kicks his ass. Dre then decides he should learn Kung-fu (I'm not quite sure why he learns kung-Fu in the 'karate' kid). When he is attacked again, his building handyman (Jackie Chan) comes to his aid. After that the older man decides to tutor Dre in the art kung-Fu.
The rest is pretty basic, Dre practices Kung-Fu so that he can fight
against the bully in a local competition. The story is basically the
same as the original version, the only differences are that the boy
moves to China instead of California, the boy is much younger and
instead of wax on, wax off, it has become jacket on, jacket off.
The acting is fine in The Karate Kid. Jaden Smith is fine, but he
doesn't have a very good script to work with. Jackie Chan is not as
good as expected, I much preferred Mr. Myagi from the original over Chan's new character (Mr. Han). Jackie Chan does not have the same sort of quite mystery, where you wonder if he is stupid or brilliant.
Although The Karate Kid has some entertaining scenes, it is, in general, not a good movie. The script is too predictable, the main character is too young and there are too many clichés, so instead of being a great classic, it becomes an afterthought in the history of underdog sports movie, lost far, far behind giants like Remember the Titans, Rudy and A League of Their Own.