Never Back Down (2008)
Win or Lose... Everyone Has Their Fight
Do you like troubled kids in schools movies? Perhaps some Karate Kid style troubled kids getting trained in martial arts? DO you like your high schools filled with toned semi-adults playing teens? Well do I have a movie for you tonight - one that spawned (let me count quick) apparently three sequels? Yeah, it looks like this movie did exactly what it said when it came to making a franchise - Never Back Down.
A kid is in a football game is doing a phenomenal job playing his roll as defense. This goes a bit off the expected path however when the opposing team decides they are fed up about getting nailed and decide to say something cross about his father - who we learn in this moment is dead - which causes a brawl on the field. We then get to see the kid and his family move to Florida, where they get to start anew for the little brothers run at being a tennis prodigy. There’s some obvious tensions going on, although we aren’t super introduced the actual core of it just yet. Anyways, to cut things short and summarize very briefly - kid with anger issues ends up finding a martial arts instructor, drama ensues, and the kid ends up having to learn a lesson about himself that could do everyone well to learn and understand.
Being that teenage drama kind of movie, some might be taking out of it by a whole lot of kids that don’t really look entirely like kids acting far more like adults with their pocket street fights and massive parties. I think most wouldn’t bat an eye at it though, and it does give an opportunity for some decent acting. Our main does a decent job displaying a range of emotions through the runtime, as does pretty near everyone on display with the exception of our main villain, who basically just gets to be a jerk for the sake of being the conceited bad guy to throw the characters emotions against. The youngest kid, although not given the most screen time by any means, does a good job with his scenes. It probably helps his character is a bit of a smarty pants, but largely him and the main character have a pretty darn good chemistry and it makes for plenty of rather wholesome or funny interactions. The mother does that family member in conflict role well against the main as well, and none of them are really ever acting so out of it that it feels unbeliveable.
The characters are benefited by the actors for sure. It’s worth a mention that each character tends to have at least a little bit of a motivator that gets to the screen at some point - whether that’s the baddies tense relationship with is dad, the demons of the main and the stressful family dynamic around him, or even the history of the teacher character. These also have a wonderful play into the main moral pitch of the movie - and the fact that the movie shows a single class session for most it’s run should only highlight what the journey of the main character will end up being. It’s a bit funny how often the “inner-battle” part of martial arts can be overlooked by people, even though most movies love to hit us over the head with it.
Family friction
Yep, there’s a lot for folks who are thinking and emotional types to get from this movie, despite it’s pitch as a fight movie. That core concept of owning your decision, of always having a choice. Some bits about trauma and how a person can handle it. Want some commentary about how toxic the drive to be the best can be? Yeah, we got a little of that in there as well. It really lets the main character end the movie in a seemingly far different place than he started. Yes, sometimes it might feel a bit movie-style quick, like the love interest’s seemingly quick turn around into liking the main character, which is probably only the fault of it not really getting into her relationship until later. Then again, people can change their minds on a dime in the real world too, so it shouldn’t really be that surprising that it takes you out of the movie anyways.
The action scenes are here though. There’s a bunch of technical stuff in there, like arm bars and leg locks and chokeholds - that UFC style stuff to most people. That being said, there’s also a lot of training scenes to build up into the more technical level as the main character works his way to a new level and find his inner peace and self. They get fun with the effects in some of these fights as well, throwing in a few things more fancy than just a little blood-goo in the mouth like slow motion and some neat little X-ray hits towards the end. The number of fights is kept reasonable for what the movie is trying to be - you get the brawl at the intro football game to set up the character, the fight with the main bad to set him up as a bad and provide a base groundwork for a lot of the drama to come, and then really only about two more fights past that if you don’t include the training fights at the gym. It’s a good usage of not putting fights in for the sake of it - each is there for a reason, to help the story or the character along.
Audio is balanced well. Soundtrack is pretty happening as well, with a few songs I definitely recognize, although in the hour it’s taken me to get to this point I can’t remember the name of most them off the top of my head to save my life. Still, I enjoy the soundtrack, and it’s what you expect from a 2000’s movie about teen fights, like that Teenagers song from My Chemical Romance, if I remember correctly. Line deliveries are good, and you won’t often find yourself feeling like someone is really phoning in lines. Much like the costumes, there isn’t a whole lot in this department that seems out of place - although in fairness, my locale never had nearly the amount of girls in bikinis as this Floridian high school scene.
Kids can’t even follow rule number one of fight club.
It’s a pretty good movie. It’s got the drama, it’s got the fights, and it’s got the core point that it doesn’t ever really forget about. With martial arts one often learns quite a lot about themselves, if only in the movies with life-changing epiphanies provided by both teacher and student. Some of the hits are pretty hardy, but it never gets overly gross about it’s violence.It’ll probably appeal to quite a few folks, and I’m sure it probably did considering the chain of sequels it got.