One look at pint-sized actor Jaden Smith and you know this isn’t “The Karate Kid” of your childhood.
Casting Will Smith’s son in the remake’s lead role means the minds behind the movie are gunning for a younger audience.
That’s hardly a shock in Hollywood these days.
But while the demographic downgrade means a less nuanced tale unfolds, the essential “Kid” themes still packs a punch.
Smith plays Dre, a pre-teen forced to move from Detroit to China when his mother (Taraji P. Henson) gets a job transfer.
Young Dre doesn’t speak the language and he has few friends at first, but he quickly – far too quickly – wins the affections of a pretty classmate.
He also draws the ire of the local bully, a thug who studies Kung Fu with an instructor to whom mercy means nothing.
So Dre takes pummeling atop pummeling until his apartment building’s maintenance man, Mr. Han (Jackie Chan), offers to teach him Kung Fu to help even the score.
This “Kid” pays homage to the 1984 original without directly stealing all the memorable bits. Instead of “Wax on, wax off,” we get Dre putting his coat on a hook, and then taking it off, repeatedly as part of Mr. Han’s mercurial training sessions.
And an early scene finds Mr. Han trying to snag a fly with chopsticks, a nice nod to the original.
Smith proves his credible turn in “The Pursuit of Happyness” three years ago was hardly a fluke. He’s a charming actor, one whose face can register several emotions in the space of a few seconds.
That puts him a few paces ahead of his child actor peers – and even that of his famous co-star.
Chan’s acting range remains a work in progress, but he buries his natural agility under a shuffling gait that speaks to his character’s hidden torment.
The two actors click all the same, their clashing styles and cultures add a richness to a one-note plot.
Setting the film in China both helps and hurts the production. It’s great to see new vistas on film, and uprooting the story gives it a freshness that more remakes should consider.
But China helped finance the movie, and many scenes play out like tourism videos for a country with a shoddy human rights record.
“The Karate Kid” didn’t need to be remade, but given current movie trends the results should prove catnip to young audiences and give Gen. Xers few reasons to grouse.
(Photo: Jackie Chan and Jaden Smith bring “The Karate Kid” back to the big screen June 11/Sony Pictures)
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“But China helped finance the movie, and many scenes play out like tourism videos for a country with a shoddy human rights record.”
Was that meant to be a joke? Unnecessary.