The Karate Kid

The Karate Kid is an American film directed by Harald Zwart in 2010, made in co-production with China. Among the production companies, alongside Columbia Pictures, are China Film Group, Overbrook Entertainment and JW Productions. It is a remake of the film of the same name from 1984, which moves the story to Beijing and changes the martial art: despite its title, the film shows kung-fu, not karate. In mainland China it was therefore released as Gongfu meng (literally Kung-fu Dream), in Japan and South Korea as Best Kid. Twelve-year-old Dre Parker (Jaden Smith) moves from Detroit to Beijing with his widowed mother. After a gang around a boy named Cheng beats him up, he is rescued by the maintenance man Mr Han (Jackie Chan), who is a kung-fu master and promises to train him. The film also features the martial arts school Fighting Dragons. Some scenes take place at the Golden Peak temple in the Wudang mountains, which a reviewer for The Philadelphia Inquirer called the spiritual home of Chinese kung-fu. The scene in which the snake stance appears takes place in a Taoist temple. The film was followed in 2025 by Karate Kid: Legends, the sixth film in the series, which brings Jackie Chan together with Ralph Macchio in the original film world of the series.

Martial arts in this work

Origin

The film was developed from late 2008 as a project for Jaden Smith, with Will Smith as producer. It was shot in Beijing from July to October 2009, and the Chinese government permitted filming in the Forbidden City, on the Great Wall and in the Wudang mountains. According to a review in The Philadelphia Inquirer, it was the first film since Bernard Bertolucci's The Last Emperor to be granted access to the Forbidden City. Jackie Chan said the crew generally called the film The Kung Fu Kid and believed it would carry such a title in various markets. However, producer Jerry Weintraub rejected Sony's proposal to change the American title, so in the USA the film was released as The Karate Kid.

Fight choreography

The fight scenes were handled by Wu Gang, a former professional competitor in competitive wushu taolu from the Shanghai team, who won gold in the changquan event at the 1998 Asian Games. He is a member of the Jackie Chan Stunt Team and worked on the film as stunt coordinator and also as Jaden Smith's coach. According to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Smith trained kung-fu with Wu Gang for three months before the four-month shoot began. We did not find anything in the sources about Smith's longer-term practice of a martial art. Jackie Chan plays the kung-fu master Mr Han. We have not been able to document what share the Jackie Chan Stunt Team had in the choreography of specific fights.

People and martial arts

• Harald ZwartDirector
• Jackie ChanActor — as Mr. Han· Kung Fu (portrays the art on screen)
• Jaden SmithActor — as Dre Parker· Kung Fu (portrays the art on screen)
• Wu GangStunt coordinator· Wushu Taolu (real practitioner)