The Next Karate Kid

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“It’s ancient wisdom against teenage spunk. 1,000 years of karate tradition is about to get a kick in the pants.”

―Film slogan

The Next Karate Kid (also known as The Karate Kid Part IV) is a 1994 American martial arts drama film starring Pat Morita and Hilary Swank. It is the fourth installment in The Karate Kid film series and a sequel to The Karate Kid trilogy.

Plot

In the spring of 1994, Mr. Miyagi travels to Boston, Massachusetts to attend a commendation for Japanese-American soldiers, who fought in the 442nd Regimental Combat Team during World War II. He meets Louisa Pierce, the widow of his commanding officer, Lieutenant Jack Pierce. At Pierce’s home, they catch up on old times and war stories.

Mr. Miyagi is introduced to Pierce’s granddaughter, Julie Pierce, a teenage girl struggling with anger issues due to her parents’ sudden death in a car accident. Her behavior has led to a large tension between Julie and her grandmother, along with her fellow students. She sneaks into the school at night to care for an injured hawk, whom she names Angel, which she keeps in a pigeon coop on the roof.

Mr. Miyagi invites Louisa to stay at his house in Los Angeles to enjoy peace and quiet tending his garden while he stays in Boston as Julie’s caretaker. At school, Julie meets and befriends Eric McGowen, a security guard in training and a pledge for a shady school security fraternity, the Alpha Elite. The members are taught to enforce the school rules, mostly by using physical force, by a self-styled colonel, Paul Dugan. In this group is Ned Randall, the short fused leader and Dugan’s toughest, strongest, and most aggressive student, who makes repeated unsuccessful sexual advances on Julie. Eric learns of Angel and promises to feed her while Julie is with Mr. Miyagi.

When Julie survives almost being hit by a car by jumping into a tiger position, she reveals to Mr. Miyagi that she was taught karate by her father, who learned from her grandfather, Mr. Miyagi’s student. The next time she sneaks into the school to feed her bird, she is detected by the Alpha Elite, and chased through the school. Julie hides in the cafeteria until Ned finds her, at which point she hits a fire alarm with her backpack, causing Ned to let go of her. Escaping the school, Julie is arrested by the police and gets suspended for two weeks by Colonel Dugan. Mr. Miyagi uses this time to take Julie to a Buddhist monastery to teach her the true ways of karate and how to handle her anger issues. However, when Mr. Miyagi and Julie are traveling to the monastery, they stop at a gas station. At the gas station, Mr. Miyagi refills the gas tank while Julie goes into the gas station store to order a chocolate bar with almonds for her and Mr. Miyagi to share for the rest of the drive to the monastery. Julie gets scared over the gas station workers’ dog while Mr. Miyagi goes into the store to pick up Julie but pets the dog in a friendly manner. When Julie and Mr. Miyagi are about to leave, the workers confront Mr. Miyagi over his treatment of their dog. Then, the workers challenge Mr. Miyagi to a physical fight where Mr. Miyagi uses his karate skills to easily defeat the workers in the process. After Julie and Mr. Miyagi drive away from the gas station, Julie expresses her amazement of Mr. Miyagi’s karate skills during the fight but Mr. Miyagi expresses how fighting is not a positive action.

At the monastery, Julie learns through direct lessons about balance, coordination, awareness and respect for all life. She befriends several monks, including the Grand Abbot. The monks host a birthday party for her, giving her a cake and an arrow that Mr. Miyagi had caught while it was in flight in a demonstration of Zen archery.

Upon Julie’s return to school, she discovers that Angel is now able to fly, and Mr. Miyagi assists Julie in releasing the bird back to the wild. In preparation for the prom, Mr. Miyagi teaches Julie how to dance, and purchases her a dress. While Julie goes to the prom with Eric, Mr. Miyagi and the Buddhist monks go bowling. A local player challenges them, loses the match, and accepts their tutelage. Under the orders of Colonel Dugan, the Alpha Elite bungee jump into the prom. When one of the members breaks his arm, Eric shows concern, but Ned tells him to mind his own business.

Eric drives Julie home and kisses her. Ned follows them, and smashes Eric’s car windows with a baseball bat. Ned challenges Eric to a fight at the docks, and is joined by Colonel Dugan and the Alpha Elite. They set fire to Eric’s car and severely beat him, but Eric is saved by Julie and Mr. Miyagi.

Ned tries to grab Julie, but she challenges him to a fight. She holds her own, using the karate she has learned, until Ned cheats by throwing sand in her face. Despite the disadvantage, Julie uses her senses. Ned tries to kick her, she counters it, pulling a strong kick to his face and defeats him. Julie turns her back on Ned in disgust. Colonel Dugan bullies the rest of the group to continue the fight, but they refuse as they now shared their respect to her and now done with him and his program. Mr. Miyagi challenges Colonel Dugan to fight and wins, leaving the Alpha Elite disappointed in their instructor. As Julie and Mr. Miyagi walk away from the scene, Mr. Miyagi explains that even though a karate fight is not positive, winning the necessary battles are always essential. The film concludes with Angel flying freely above the water.

Cast

• Noriyuki “Pat” Morita as Mr. Miyagi
• Hilary Swank as Julie Pierce
• Michael Ironside as Colonel Paul Dugan
• Constance Towers as Louisa Pierce
• Chris Conrad as Eric McGowen
• Michael Cavalieri as Ned Randall
• Walton Goggins as Charlie
• Tom O’Brien as Gabe
• Thomas Downey as Morgan
• Frank Welker as Angel the Hawk (voice)
• Arsenio ‘Sonny’ Trinidad as Abbot Monk

Production

All the interior and exterior high school scenes were filmed on the Brookline High School campus, except for the scene in the gymnasium. The exterior shot is the Brookline High School gym, but the interior was Cousens Gymnasium at Tufts University. Other scenes from the movie were shot in the Boston area. For example, the scenes at Julie’s house were filmed in nearby Newton.

The first three movies in the series, which featured Ralph Macchio as Daniel LaRusso, were set in Los Angeles, California. In this movie, the setting is changed to Boston, Massachusetts.

Mr. Miyagi’s approach to karate-training is different as well, although he still has Julie wash cars (“Wax on, wax off”) in order to teach her how to block punches and kicks. In the original 1984 film, Daniel used to think karate came from Buddhist temples; Miyagi chides him, “You watch too much TV.” (Shaolin Buddhist temples were actually some of the origin locations of kung fu.) In The Next Karate Kid, Miyagi actually trains Julie at a Japanese monastery.

Because Hilary Swank could learn the advanced “flashy” moves and had trouble with the beginner moves, Pat E. Johnson, the martial arts choreographer, awarded her with a “Pink” belt, a mix of the white (beginner) and red (the one just under black in that particular style).

In all the four movies, the reunion scene is the only time Miyagi actually wears his Medal of Honor. The Medal of Honor is worn on a silk ribbon around the neck, not pinned through a jacket. The only other decoration issued by the United States worn in a similar manner is the Legion of Merit.

Conforming to the title changes of the first, second and third The Karate Kid films for their releases in Japan, The Next Karate Kid was renamed Best Kid 4 (ベスト・キッド4/Besuto kiddo 4); the major and obvious change is that this movie’s translated title now explicitly identifies it as the fourth in the series.

John G. Avildsen, the director of the first three films in the series, dropped out of this one because he needed to direct the film 8 Seconds. As a result, Christopher Cain took over in the director’s chair.

The Next Karate Kid is the only film in the series in which screenwriter Robert Mark Kamen, who had written all three of the others for the screen, did not have a writing credit.

The 1994 top ten hit “You Gotta Be” by Des’ree was featured during the ending credits of the film.

Reception

The Next Karate Kid has been critically panned. However, many critics praised Swank, and it is still considered to be her break-out performance. The films consensus on Rotten Tomatoes is “The Next Karate Kid is noteworthy for giving audiences the chance to see a pre-Oscars Hilary Swank, but other than a typically solid performance from Pat Morita, this unnecessary fourth installment in the franchise has very little to offer.” Stephen Holden said it “may be the silliest episode yet in the popular Karate Kid series,” a film that “doesn’t even try to achieve surface credibility;” about the only thing positive Holden says about the film is that Swank makes an “appealing debut.”

In February 2005, upon the release of the three-DVD “Karate Kid Collection,” Variety magazine called The Next Karate Kid a “boilerplate coming-of-age sequel,” but notes that Swank’s “plucky determination and athletic drive shines through” as she would later do in Million Dollar Baby.

The Next Karate Kid was by some margin the least successful movie of the series at the domestic box office. Indeed, the film’s performance ensured that the franchise disappeared from cinemas for sixteen years, only reappearing in 2010 with a remake of the original movie. The total box office gross for The Next Karate Kid was $8.9 million, compared to $90.8 million for the original, $115.1 million for Part II, $38.9 million for Part III, and $171.8 million for the 2010 Karate Kid.

Home Media

The film was released on DVD on August 28, 2001. A manufacture on demand Blu-ray release was released on September 6, 2016 as part of Sony’s Choice Collection.

External links

• https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110657/
• https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/next_karate_kid/
• https://www.allmovie.com/movie/v133409
• http://www.boxofficemojo.com/movies/?id=karatekid4.htm

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