I have blogged about my anticipation for The Karate Kid movie earlier. I also understood that it drew criticism over its title, being The Karate Kid but in the movie it was Chinese Kung Fu that was picked up by Drey (Jaden Smith), the protagonist in the this movie. I have also found out from wikipedia, the move titles are different in China, South Korea and Japan. I think the difference in movie titles seems to have happened in other movies before and I can never understand why can't the producers decide on one good movie title and standardise.
I find that this is really not exactly a remake but in fact added a bit depth to give mature viewers a good thought about life. I sort of feel that there are certain Taoist-philosophy embedded throughout the movie.
I really appreciate the contents in the movie and I am impressed with Jackie Chan's performance. This is probably his only movie in his entire career that has only one fight scene throughout the show. Maybe it's really high time for Jackie to try out movie of other genre and this movie could be one of them. I really enjoy his performance in the movie by starting out as an unfeeling maintenance man to an eccentric displinarian.
I liked the self-control part where Yu Rongguang grabbed Jackie by his wrist and taunting for a challenge. It felt like as if Jackie would going to fight him there but it didn't happened. I wonder is it because of the Mr Han seems not to be so good in health. We can see him panting heavily after fighting the kids off for Drey, not so typical of Jackie's character huh? Yu Rongguang seems like a more successful master whereby he has more students and being fit on his own. Jackie in the show, however, is still nursing from the loss of his family.
It was obviously that Jackie couldn't agree with his methods of martial arts training and that's why we can hear him telling Jaden, "That is not kung fu, that is a bad man teaching very bad thing!"
I am also impressed with Jaden's performance especially during the scene where Jackie lost himself. I'm not sure is this an American movie trend but I realised in recent movies, the heros have, instead of make belief that they are invincible, been made to look as fallible as any other men. Jackie would have been Jaden's hero but he had his issues as well.
Just found an interesting difference between Mr Miyagi with Mr Han. Mr Miyagi was a dedicated soldier during the War World II and had his wife and son eventually died during complicated childbirth. As compared to Mr Han who was partly responsible for causing the death of his wife and son. I felt that the grief that they harbour will be very different. Mr Han still can't remember what was the argument that he had with his wife that led to the tragic accident. He hopes it was something important. But...would that help to lessen some of his pain? I quite like that the movie didn't say what was that something that Mr Han cannot remember. I find that it is not necessary to explain everything when you're doing a storytelling.
I quite like the boy who played the role of Cheng. He's so cute in the first place and playing the bad boy makes him look so cool! Pardon his English but I think he had done his best for that! I even like how he did his frontal thrust kick. It sure looks painful!
The only part that I found it pity was actually the kissing scene between Jaden and the girl. I thought that if the romance was removed and a mutual but close friendship in place would be more appropriate.
I especially like the scene that Jaden questioned Jackie about the Taoist nun (I think is she?) and the cobra. The theory that Jackie explain is so spiritual and falls along the line (that I believe) that spirituality and martial arts are closely related. I guess I will remember this line from Jackie to Jaden for a long time:-
"Being still and doing nothing are two different things."
