Karate Kid

"No pun intended, was raised by the power of Will." A piece of the lyrics of Justin Bieber ft. Jaden Smith, "Never Say Never". Curious about the power of Will? Yes, you're right. Jaden Smith is the son of Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith. The song itself serves as one of the soundtrack for the 1984 remake, Karate Kid. The Smith family works together, but with Jaden Smith's parents being the producer. The director is Harald Zwart who directed Pink Panther 2.

So the film sets in China. No, I'm not making a mistake. And yes, I know karate is originated from Japan. But, how do they convinced you that this is the remake if they named it, Kung Fu Kid? I remind you, this is a remake. A pretty good one. Why? If I'm telling you one by one the page won't fit. I recommend you, no, I insist you to go to a nearby cinema and watch this.

The story follows closely to the original Karate Kid, Dre Parker (Jaden Smith), who lost his dad, and his mom, Sherry Parker (Taraji P. Henson) move to China because of his mom's career. He's so upset about moving, as he is leaving his friends in Detroit. Arriving in his new apartment, he befriend fellow American, Mark (Christopher Hillman) who assists him around the neighborhood. At the local park, he has a crush on Chinese girl who plays violin, Mei Ying (Wenwen Han). Suddenly, Cheng (Zhenwei Wang) approach him and tells him to keeps away. Agitated, Dre attacks him only to be beaten up, as Cheng learns kung fu. At school, Dre gets bullied by Cheng and his gang. Until, he is attack fiercely by Cheng and Cheng's dojomate and saved by his apartment maintenance man, Mr. Han (Jackie Chan) who apparently proficient in kung fu and beats them all. He requested Mr. Han to accompany him to visit to Cheng's dojo and tells that Cheng's teacher ways of teaching kung fu is not kung fu. Then, they're challenged to fight but Mr. Han says that Dre will fight at the upcoming tournament. Mr. Han then agreed to teach Dre, and this involve kind of training that Dre doesn't understand, just putting his jacket on, putting it off, hang it, drops it, and repeat the same move every day. He even thinks that Mr. Han knows nothing about kung fu. Soon later, he learns that the move itself is the basic technique. To cut the story short, he finally comes to attend the tournament.

Mother and son moving from their old city to a new place, gang of bully with brutal move, crush with local girl, kind and wise maintenance man who mastered self-defense, strange training, tournament. Reminds you of the old time? Daniel LaRusso and Mr.Miyagi? Yes, as it is a remake, it follows the story line of the original movie pretty close. But they did it in a very magnificent way. Brilliant. And this movie is one whole package, emotional time, funny but not cheesy, fun to watch. You know what? When I watch Karate Kid, the whole audience clapped not only at the ending, also at the tournament scene. It feels like I'm watching a live tournament.

Jaden Smith is indeed showing his big talent in acting, also in singing for the soundtrack. He is the son of Will Smith. I'm pretty sure that he has pretty bright future in the industry. Also we see the other side of Jackie Chan, who usually plays funny role, but he is also plays pretty well portraying a wise man with a dark past. He managed to catched our emotion, at least mine. To be honest, I nearly cried watching the scene when .... (No no I won't give you a spoiler here.) But a clue, similiar scene when Mr. Miyagi made you cry (If you cry back then.)

I don't know what to say. I give Karate Kid a perfect score. Especially for a remake. Jaden Smith, Jackie Chan, Harald Zwart, Will Smith, Jada Pinkett-Smith, Taraji P. Henson, all work pretty hard to make this movie. And they did it. I'm pretty sure Pat Morita who portrays Mr. Miyagi in the original series would be proud seeing the remake if he still alive. I really appreciate his works on Karate Kid, as he's one of my favorite. Too bad he died on 2005, thank you for your great contribution Mr. Miyagi!