Film Review: THE NEXT KARATE KID (1994, Christopher Cain)

Stars: 2 of 5.

Running Time: 107 minutes. 

Notable Cast or Crew: Hilary Swank (BOYS DON'T CRY, MILLION DOLLAR BABY), Pat Morita (THE KARATE KID, COLLISION COURSE), Michael Ironside (TOTAL RECALL, SCANNERS), Sonny Trinidad (THE KARATE KID PART II, DARKMAN), Walton Goggins (VICE PRINCIPALS, THE HATEFUL EIGHT), Constance Towers (SHOCK CORRIDOR, THE NAKED KISS), Chris Conrad ("Johnny Cage" in MORTAL KOMBAT: ANNIHILATION, CLEAR AND PRESENT DANGER). Cinematography by Lazlo Kovacs (FIVE EASY PIECES, EASY RIDER).

Tag-line: "Who says the good guy has to be a guy?"

Best one-liner:  "I don't care if you're a friend of the Pope!"

 

Okay, so I'm here to talk to you about THE NEXT KARATE KID. And what can I say? It shifts the action from the iconic Los Angeles/"All Valley" environs to the suburbs of Boston. It dumps Cobra Kai for a weird high school jock-club called the "Alpha Elite." It feels mostly like a generic KARATE KID rip-off that managed to accidentally snag Pat Morita, so they had to quickly rebrand it as a bona fide sequel. Also, this thing is shot by ace Hungarian arthouse cinematographer Lazlo Kovacs. Lazlo "FIVE EASY PIECES/PAPER MOON/EASY RIDER" Kovacs. Madness.

Hilary Swank plays Julie Pierce, Mr. Miyagi's latest protégé. She's the bangs-wearing granddaughter of a Miyagi war buddy and an orphan being cared for by her grandmother (Constance Towers, of Sam Fuller fame). She is introduced while giving a series of eyebrow-arching exposition dumps to her grandmother; all of which is information that she already knows.

 Just an incredible way to convey that information.

In subsequent years, Hilary Swank went on to perform nuanced and award-winning work in a number of studio and indie films and has even won two Oscars for her efforts. In THE NEXT KARATE KID, however, she is–––how do I put this?––"not great." It's not entirely her fault; the screenplay is a mess and I'm certain that the majority of the direction she received was "crinkle your face as if you are smelling an unpleasant odor," which is certainly a choice. Hey, it's from the director of YOUNG GUNS, I don't know what you want.

And even though Swank is twenty years old and far more high school-adjacent than anyone who appeared in GREASE, the costuming and styling here make her look, to my eyes, like a thirty-year-old playing Punky Brewster. However, it was my wife who really hit the nail on the head when she said, "She looks like she's supposed to be Michelle Tanner's visiting Greek cousin from that one episode of FULL HOUSE"

 

which is probably the most accurate assessment we're ever going to get. We can go ahead and close the book on that one. 

Anyway, Swank's character is content to play hooky and deliver monologues to her pet bird of prey,

but then, look out, folks: bullies!

These tuff guys in the Levis are members of the aforementioned "Alpha Elite," and the only one of them who looks under forty is Baby Walton Goggins.

Wait, what... Goggins?! (I happen to think he's one of our finest working actors, and it's hilarious to see him play a twerpy little bully like this. Love it. Just think of it as a prequel to VICE PRINCIPALS.)

The Alpha Elite are overseen by legendary Canadian character actor and Junta Juleil hall-of-famer, Michael Ironside. 

He is the ersatz John Kreese of this movie, and it's a role Ironside was born to play. Bellowing at middle-aged high schoolers about how they need to "toughen up," baring his teeth, and kickin' butt. That's the Ironside way. He's basically his character from STARSHIP TROOPERS. When Miyagi shows up to cast aspersions on his teaching acumen,

he stares him down with that patented Ironside crazy-face (see also: HIGHLANDER 2: THE QUICKENING) 

 

and says, "I don't care if you're a friend of the Pope." Um, good one?

I think the Alpha Elite are supposed to be a dojo, a sports team, an ROTC-type organization, and the high school's hall monitors, all at once. None of this really matters, because the movie is not so invested in their plot line. Ironside gets about fifteen minutes of screen-time, and the movie routinely and immediately forgets about the Alpha Elite each time they are built up as a threat.

At prom, they bungee jump down from the rafters and... intimidate the crowd, I guess?

I don't know why this happens, or to what purpose, and, hell, I just watched the movie.

The bulk of the film revolves around Swank's karate training which takes place at a Zen Buddhist monastery somewhere in the wilds of Massachusetts. Hilary Swank practices karate moves in a montage set to a song by The Cranberries.

This is mostly to remind us that it's 1994, but it also demonstrates that Hilary Swank's karate moves are technically more proficient than Ralph Macchio's. Heresy? I don't think so. Look at that crane kick. Elsewhere, she's got some practically JCVD-adjacent extension.

There's a zany subplot where the monks leave the monastery and go bowling. I never promised you a rose garden.

Look at this shirt Miyagi is wearing. Just look at it.

 (Borrowed from Sinbad?)

Because "wax on, wax off" is far too manly to teach to a woman, apparently, Swank obtains her "karate while doing a mundane task" merit badge from Miyagi by... babysitting.

Also, the entire sequence is written and shot in such a way as to render it completely indistinguishable from an actual NERF commercial. Anyway, that's how women learn karate in the film's universe: through childcare and NERF fights. Whew.

There's also a subplot where Swank is dating this forty-five-year-old high school student,

and ya know what, we can just skip that, it's cool.

All of this leads to a sudden finale where a car gets blown up

and then Ironside comes back for revenge, 

and it feels very unmotivated, like what's he getting revenge for exactly?, and then Ironside's faux-Kreese battles Miyagi in a facsimile of the fight scene that opens KARATE KID PART II, except instead of booping his opponent's nose at a climactic moment,

Miyagi comically blows him over with a puff of air. There's a bit of fight choreography that stuck out to me, though: at one point, Miyagi grabs Ironside by his forearms, causing him to look down in horror,

a strange replay/homage to the iconic Schwarzenegger vs. Ironside "See you at the party, Richter" fight in TOTAL RECALL,  

 wherein Ironside loses his arms. So there you have it, folks: THE NEXT KARATE KID.

As a final note, I think that TV's COBRA KAI––which is one of the best purveyors of nostalgia out there, and the best current '80s reboot I can think of––should absolutely embrace THE NEXT KARATE KID. Get Walton Goggins and Michael Ironside in there. Then Hilary Swank should show up in the series finale, announce that Miyagi taught only her his most treasured karate secrets, and kick everyone's ass.

Only now does it occur to me... PERFECT STRANGERS, "COUCH POTATO" (3x10) (1987)

Only now does it occur to me... that nestled within a "very special episode" of PERFECT STRANGERS (devoted to Balki's slow, spiraling descent into severe TV addiction) is a deep cut homage to Arnold Schwarzenegger's 80s actioners.

After days of erratic behavior, Larry (Mark Linn-Baker) tries to force his cousin Balki (Bronson Pinchot) to put the remote down and go to bed, but Balki explains the importance of his cable viewing:

Larry: "You keep changing the channel."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Balki: "But cousin, it's easy: on this channel, Arnold Schwarzenegger is blowing up drug dealers."

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Balki: "And on this channel, Arnold Schwarzenegger is blowing up soldiers. Oh, there goes one now!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Balki: "And on this channel, Arnold Schwarzenegger is blowing up drug-dealing soldiers."

 

 

 

Balki: "I just love cable. There's so much variety!"

 

Couched inside this joke––which is premised on all Schwarzenegger flicks being the same––and given that this is December 1987, I believe I can actually determine what films Balki is watching: the film where Arnold is blowing up drug dealers must be RAW DEAL (1986), the film where Arnold is blowing up soldiers must be the first act of PREDATOR (1987), and the film where Arnold is blowing up drug-dealing soldiers, must be the Val Verde-set third act of COMMANDO (1985). Obviously Arnold's mid-80s output is a complex tapestry of artistic forms. Take that, cousin Larry!

Only now does it occur to me... DOUBLE IMPACT (1991)

Only now does it occur to me... that DOUBLE IMPACT takes us but one step closer to the ultimate dream: a movie inhabited only by Jean-Claude Van Dammes.

Sadly, this step is not enough. Honestly, this is one of the weaker JCVD films from his Golden Era, even though the set up is half BATMAN, half-STAR WARS. When their parents are killed (on the way to the opera?) by Hong Kong triads

including, Bolo Yeung, he of the crazy-face in BLOODSPORT,

the identical twin baby JCVDs are separated and whisked away to safety. One remains in Hong Kong to become a badass, and one is whisked off to the U.S.A. by Geoffrey Lewis (EVERY WHICH WAY BUT LOOSE, BRONCO BILLY, SALEM'S LOT, MAVERICK), who is basically the Obi-Wan Kenobi of this scenario.

This American JCVD becomes an '80s aerobics instructor, and there's a reason why the brief scene in his studio is probably the best in the film. That reason is JCVD saying "I can do the splits, no problem" to a bevy of admiring fitness gals

"Noooo problem"


and then humping the floor at full extension


for their gratification and ours, apparently. Oh, and did I say this took place inside "JCVD's aerobics studio?" Obviously, I meant "in the waiting room to an office space the production had access to, maybe even the production company's offices."


Not knowing about his secret twin or murdered parents, he then heads to Hong Kong, wearing the best pink-centric ensembles 1991 could provide:

note the shorts:

Who... me?

After some mistaken identity shenanigans and JCVD #2 almost accidentally hooking up with JCVD #1's girlfriend who is a kind of "Cannon Films Jessica Rabbit"/"ersatz Jessica Lange" (Alonna Shaw)

the twin brothers have their shocking first meeting:

 
Well-acted, sir

At first, they hate each other because Hong Kong badass JCVD thinks that aerobics instructor JCVD is a "black silk underwear-wearing" homophobic slur.

Somehow they ended up with the exact same physiques and Belgian accents, despite being raised in Hong Kong and the U.S.A., respectively. Unlike the writers of TWINS, the writers of DOUBLE IMPACT are definitely on the "nature" end of the "nature vs. nuture" debate. The dual JCVDs end up fostering a mutual respect from beating up bad guys and shooting them with dual-wielded handguns, which feels like JCVD auditioning for a John Woo movie.

The audition worked, by the way––by '93, he was starring in Woo's HARD TARGET

This whole thing is pretty half-baked and there are four names on the screenplay, including Jean-Claude Van Damme himself (who wrote THE QUEST, if you'll recall) and Sheldon Lettich (RAMBO III, BLOODSPORT). There's a BLOODSPORT-referencing scene whereupon somebody's nuts get punched, but unlike in that masterpiece, or in LIONHEART or in KICKBOXER, here it's JCVD getting smacked instead of doing the smacking.



The smacker is Bolo Yeung himself, undermining JCVD's trademark move. (You'll recall that I am the web's leading authority on "brutal ball-squeezing.")

As the film lurches toward its finale, we have a lot of emoting

and a Bolo/JCVD rematch involving a big-ass oil barrel, which feels like a bit out of the video game FINAL FIGHT.


Another highlight is Corinna Everson (NATURAL BORN KILLERS, HERCULES: THE LEGENDARY JOURNEYS), a bodybuilder and Ms. Olympia who plays a minor villain here

and sort of comes across as "dominatrix Laurie Metcalf," or, at the very least, the "Sensational Sherri" to Alonna Shaw's "Miss Elizabeth," as it were.

Anywho, the two JCVDs ultimately hug it out


and it ends on on a freeze frame that is better than 97% of the movie. Notably this freeze frame:

I'll leave you with a benediction, or maybe an epitaph, spoken aloud by my better half near the conclusion of DOUBLE IMPACT:

"CYBORG is a much better movie than this."   –My Wife

R.I.P., Yaphet Kotto

R.I.P. to the inimitable Yaphet Kotto, whose rogue's gallery of bold, funny, scary, lovable, and offbeat characters left an indelible mark on studio pictures, the art house, and genre film alike. He's been eaten by the Alien. Headlined seven seasons of HOMICIDE: LIFE ON THE STREET and cameoed on THE WIRE. He's beaten the shit out Freddy Kruger with a ball bat. He's dropped grenades from a cropduster while blasting James Brown in order to help save Gary Busey (in EYE OF THE TIGER). He's run alongside Arnold Schwarzenegger on futuristic gladiatorial TV. He's played Othello. He's worked with Paul Schrader, Larry Cohen, William Wyler, and Rod Serling. He's played a Bond villain. He's even been on MURDER, SHE WROTE. Standout performances include BONE, BLUE COLLAR, MIDNIGHT RUN, ACROSS 110TH STREET, and the aforementioned ALIEN.  You can see him deliver award-worthy performances in less prestigious fare like EXTREME JUSTICE, THE PARK IS MINE, THE RUNNING MAN, and TRUCK TURNER. You can even see him uncovering the racial bias of NYC cabbies in a notorious segment from Michael Moore's TV NATION. He was a one of a kind badass, a profound and sincere actor whose performances could turn on a dime from the brave to the sinister to the comical, and he'll be deeply missed.

Only now does it occur to me... MURDER BY DECREE (1979)

Only now does it occur to me... that if we were staging a March Madness-style tournament of Donald Sutherland mustaches, I do believe we've found our number one seed.

 

To quote Kurt Russell, who wore a similar Franz Joseph-sweeper in TOMBSTONE and THE HATEFUL EIGHT, "It's a mustache wearing a man."

(Also, if we're comparing late 1970s revisionist Jack the Ripper movies, I prefer TIME AFTER TIME––but Bob Clark's MURDER BY DECREE is still an enjoyable, horror-adjacent Sherlock Holmes flick with the inspired casting of Christoper Plummer as Holmes and James Mason as Watson.)