Break Stuff

It's been 24 years since the original Karate Kid hit our screens way back in 1984 and it inspired an entire generation to take up martial arts (don't pretend you didn't at least attempt a crane kick back in the day). Never Back Down could almost be a carbon copy of that great film.

Jake Tyler (Sean Faris) moves to a new town - check, doesn't fit in - check, gets beaten up at a party - check by a blond bully (Cam Gigandet) - check, falls in love with a girl (Amber Heard) who happens to be the girlfriend of the guy who just knocked the snot out of him - check, gets martial arts training and guidance from a mysterious man who lives on his own (Djimon Hounsou) – check.

However, whilst the Mr Miyagi in the Karate kid promotes a lesson of tolerance, “Karate for defense only”, Never Back Down seems to inspire a different line of thinking. Whilst Jake is told by his trainer that fighting isn't the solution to his problems (indeed he bans him from training when he finds that he's been fighting outside of class), but he also tell him to “never back down” from a challenge and although he has physical training in mind when he says it, it's difficult not to take the opposite meaning to heart.

And whilst Miyagi's training comes with a great deal of life philosophy “lesson for whole life”, Jean Roqua's seems to be more concerned with teaching Jake to be a better fighter but not a better person.

I really wasn't expecting much from this movie but actually it's very entertaining. Jeff Wadlow's direction makes the film seem like an MTV video, all pretty people and emo soundtrack but the movie's quite compulsive watching. Anyone that's every watched Jean-Claude Van Damme's Bloodsport or Kickboxer and enjoyed it will be right at home here. And like those movies, cliché is the meat and two veg of Never Back Down. “You're like the shield of Achilles” blubs Amber Heard near the film's climax “fighting so you don't have to fight”. I'm sure that that line didn't mean to elicit laughter but I and everyone around me found it hard to stifle a giggle.