Although, to quote a popular song, I wasn’t born in the eighties, I did grow up in the eighties, which meant I experienced and can lovingly remember some brilliant films that came out at that time. It also means that I treasure those films and the memories that I have of them and of the times that surround them. Trying to get some people to appreciate films that they did not grow up with or have loving memories of films is a difficult task. To have experienced some films when you were at an age to believe in their messages or in their special effects and well meaning characters can mean that your appreciation of them can be greatly different to someone who experiences them at a totally different time in their lives.
In my opinion The Karate Kid is not one of these films, in my opinion the film still stands up, it can still be appreciated. The performances, the characters and the action, which you regularly see edited for TV are all quality, so good that it spawned two follow on films with Ralph Macchio and a third, The Next Karate Kid, with Hilary Swank in the title role. Pat Morita as The Karate Kid’s teacher is ingrained into the social consciousness of that generation along with his legendary crane technique.
Obviously my opinion is not held by all as the powers that be (Columbia Pictures) have seen fit to re-make the film, originally calling it The Kung Fu Kid, which according to one enthusiast on IMDB would have been far more appropriate due to the fighting style and Jackie Chan, who takes Mortia’s role as the teacher, was originally trained in Kung Fu and states in the film that he will teach Jaden Smith, Will Smith’s son who is in the title role, the real Kung Fu.
As a fan of the original I was against the film being remade due to what I have stated above, but not wanting to judge a film too harshly before I have seen it as some remakes can be an enjoyable film, not as a replacement as such but as a stand alone, I watched the trailer. I didn’t find the little nods to the original too offensive such as the, “I just want to go home”, and even when Jackie Chan uses a fly swatter instead of his chopsticks to catch the fly mocking an iconic scene in the film. But something was niggling away at me while I was watching it and I started thinking that it was the fact that I was getting old and too far removed from the film but at during one scene I realised it wasn’t my age that was the problem it was the cast’s.
Jaden and Jackie Chan are both very young.
It really became apparent to me at the time that the teacher sees his students to be, getting beaten up and dives in to help him. In the original, the main character of Daniel Laruson was played by Ralph Macchio who was around 20 at the time and therefore he was taking a proper beating from men in skeleton outfits that had recently jumped off their motorbikes. He was then helped out by Pat Morita who was a relatively unknown actor who shocked Laruso and the audience with his Karate skills. Cut to 2010 and we see Jayden Smith who is around 13 getting pushed around by other year 7s and in steps Jackie Chan a well known expert who has been ass kicking his way through mainstream Hollywood movies for around 10 years and beats up the little kids.
I do appreciate that my film tastes may change and I could lose some appreciation that I once had for classics in time, I have come to accept that but when I get older and the characters get younger what chance do I have?
Thank you for visiting my site and if you are a returner thanks for returning. In order to keep you returning to this site I will endeavour to speak out all the more.
This year my aim is to make a post at least once a week, whether it be a comment on Film and Media issues or a review of a film or media text.
I welcome all comments on anything that I have said so far or my upcoming posts, it will help to dilute the amount of Spam that I receive on a regular basis.
To begin my posts I have updated the short review of Transformers 2 with a slightly longer one and included a comment about Charlie Brooker’s review of the year.
I wanted put a post on the site about Feeds really as I am so pleased with my own set. When I have heard of or have seen something really good I like to promote it to friends and general listeners. I felt this way when I heard ‘Rapper’s Delight’ by the Sugar Hill Gang and when I had seen the TV series 24 (the third series especially, but not once it got to the fifth series), I thought it was amazing and wanted everyone else to be watching it as well.
Feeds or RSS Feeds, meaning Really Simple Syndication, for anyone that doesn’t already know are often attached to a website and allow you to ’subscribe’ to it, you will notice them where you see the icon as pictured above: there is also one in the top right of your window right now that will allow you to subscribe to this very site! You can build up a large range of Feeds that will allow you to stay up to date on a range of issues or with a range of writers.
Your feeds go directly to your ‘Reader’ which lets you know how many notes you have to read from your chosen site. There are different readers for you to choose from that will keep your feeds and when you subscribe you choose and direct your feeds to it, otherwise you can input or search for new feeds within your reader. I use Google Reader but you can gather Feeds through most web browsers or through such sites as My Yahoo or Bloglines. I have Feeds coming to me from a range of topics such as: Charlie Brookers (a Guardian newspaper columnist), Total Film, Hull City, Other media bloggers and I even have specific media related jobs. It is a little bit like creating your own website with your own specified topics. Newspapers are especially good for these as they have a large range of individual topics that you can subscribe to.
Enjoy and have a go yourself, let me know if you have trouble.
I noticed this detailed article on the representation of, ‘What makes a good female role model’, on a link from my Google reader:
Believe it or not, a man can discuss and write about issues of feminism. While some may be woefully ignorant or just banefully uninterested, take notice, guys, you shouldn’t be. And not all of us are — completely, anyway. So, with that in mind, there’s one particular issue of feminism, of the representation of females, that I want to discuss at the moment: What makes a great female role model?(Of course, as localized to the medium of film.) What are the elements of a female character that should be most sought after by writers hoping to create strong, relatable, fleshed-out characters? What makes the characters who imbue those elements great role models? And what are some of the best female role models in film? (Brandon Lee Tenney)
The article discusses a range of contemporary female characters and what they add in terms of female representation.
Product placement will now be allowed on UK telvision; a move which is said could be worth 100 million a year.
Untill recently programmes have been forced to cover up brands used within programmes and keep them out of the scripts in order to comply with UK guidelines on advertising. These rules have led certain programmes such as Coronation Street to invent their own brands, like the ‘Newton and Ridley’ ale.
Only programmes on the BBC and Children’s television has been spared in this unleashing of covert advertising.
Some might say that these rules being relaxed could lead to a more realistic portrayal of life on the box. However, with advertisers no doubt queing up to have their foods and drinks consumed by characters, electrical products used and names mentioned, where will the line be. A spokesman from Big Brother is quoted on the BBC website saying that the fear of losing viewers will set the guidelines in taste and decency in the use of advertising but with so many channels and many programmes jostling for position standards could suffer. Also are we in danger of having the advertisng executives asking for such things as certain characters using or wearing brands or mentioning their favourites…watch this space
Advertising agencies are faced with a number of challenges, including trying to reach an audience that are consistently bombarded with information they don’t want and consequently, trying to think of new ways to reach and entertain audiences.
Two recent campaigns include ways to reach an audience that have been derived from progression, in the first case technology and the second social consicence.
The first campaign that I am referring to isEntertainment Weekly’sdecision to include an LCD screen in their September issue of their magazine (I first found out about this fromCharlie Brooker’s Screenburn column). This marks the first movement for a magazine away from the printed page, other than those DVDs that have been included with magazines in the past. As with these magazines, the LCD has been included in order to allow readers/viewers to preview films and TV programmes of the future.
The second campaign that you may well have heard all about it the is Talk Talk’s publicity stunt of Put Pocketing Put Pocketing is the practise of placing money into the pockets of unsuspecting passers by, with notes attached explaining what has happened. Talk Talk have justified doing this stunt, opposed by the Metropoliton Police, by saying that a mobile phone company can still give something back to the British public with no strings attached.
Interesting and inventive ideas here in order to reach a public that has so many different ways to access their own media without having to be spoken to by advertisers.
Please comment with information on any other advertising campaigns that have used different methods to reach its audience.
Totally unrelated to the story about breakthrough performances, I wanted to highlight the recent stories of people using their Twitter page to unveil thoughts and intentions for the first time. Twitter is a site that allows anyone to leave 140 character mini blogs to keep people updated on their their thoughts and actions, many celebrities use this but it is open to anyone. Once you have an account you can link to celebrities and friends and will be continually updated about their posts. More and more we are seeing stories breaking on Twitter. Recently in the news (sorry about the sports angle if you are not that way inclined) there have been two footballers, Darren Bent and Jozy Altidore that have revealled their transfer intentions on their Twitter page, much to the surprise of their clubs and the rest of the media has got hold of it and ran with the story. This highlights a few media issues: firstly that Twitter is now becoming a major source of news for the world, secondly that the world is watching and so can you and third that people often care about what is written down; using websites, blogs and forums to get our points across can really work.
Dave Carroll has released a youtube video and song after his year long dealings with United Airlines. The story goes that he was on a flight and saw his guitar being thrown into the airplane by a baggage handler, complained and got nowhere. He reached his destination and confirmed that the guitar has been broken: again he got nowhere by complaining. In true power to the people style, he wrote a song and created a video, which was put onto Youtube called, United Breaks Guitars. The video had got close to 4 million hits at the point that I looked at it.
Although Carroll was quoted as say that, “it is not a working man’s protest song”, in Rolling Stone magazine, the comments on Youtube reflect a lot of anger with United Airlines and subsequently with Carroll when he didn’t twist the knife when United began reacting to the public relations nightmare. Carroll also alludes to the treatment of Ms. Irlweg, who he refers to in the song, following the song trying to get people to give her “a bit of a break”, no pun intended, its an actual quote.
The song is a catchy and funny one and Carroll deserves the credit for that and for taking the lighhearted approach to voicing his complaint.
From a media studies point of view, we can see how a $150 music video has gone viral and create a priceless amount of publicity and links to the power of interactive software and its ability to reach people and get them involved in a cause or product.
Also click here to link to the best complaint letter ever, which got the writer a phone call from Richard Branson and a job taste testing food at Virgin Airlines.
