Karate Kid, The

Martial arts films enjoyed an increase in popularity during the 1980s, but even Chuck Norris, the martial arts star of the period best known by mainstream audiences, never had a blockbuster hit. That status was reserved for The Karate Kid, a 1984 film directed by John Avildsen (who also directed Rocky) with a screenplay by Robert Mark Kamen. The movie stars Ralph Macchio as Daniel LaRusso, a teenager who moves with his mother from Newark, New Jersey, to Los Angeles, and Pat Morita as Mr. Kesuke Miyagi, a maintenance man with a tragic history who is a karate master. With Daniel's ethnic name and Mr. Miyagi's obvious ethnicity and rich history, something new was added to martial arts films. Mainstream audiences embraced the movie. It was one of the year's most popular films, and it spawned three sequels. Pat Morita's character became an essential figure in the genre. A 2010 remake added new cultural ingredients to the mix.

The first Karate Kid movie combined the underdog theme of Rocky with a juvenile hero and the wisdom of the benevolent sensei figure. Although the movie assigns no particular ethnicity to Daniel LaRusso, both the character's name and his appearance are in marked contrast to his enemy, Johnny Lawrence, leader of the Cobra Kai (played by Billy Zabka). Lawrence's name, Scots-English in origin, and the character's fair-skinned blondness plus his wealth identify him as the one with the power. Lawrence and his Cobra Kai buddies look like a Nazi youth group. Daniel is smaller, darker, poorer, and weaker. Macchio's ethnic background is a mixture of Italian and Greek. Although Mr. Miyagi teaches Daniel discipline, balance, and nonviolence, it was his defeating the Cobra Kai against all odds plus ending up with a classic car and the girl that had boys all over America signing up for karate classes and practicing moves from the movie if no classes were available.

It was Mr. Miyagi who made the movie more than an entertaining action film for males under 14. An immigrant from Okinawa, Miyagi left his home to avoid a fight to the death. During World War II, he and his wife were interned in the Manzanar camp. He joined the Army and fought with the 442nd Infantry Regiment, receiving the Medal of Honor. (Manzanar was one of the 10 internment camps for Japanese Americans in World War II, and the 442nd was a Japanese American regiment, the U.S. Army's most highly decorated regiment.) While he was serving his country, his wife died in childbirth; their son died as well.

Morita, the son of Japanese immigrants who spent part of his childhood in a Japanese internment camp in Arizona, played Miyagi with humor, grace, and wisdom persuasive enough to make audiences believe in the benevolence and special gifts of Miyagi. The film industry recognized the strength of his performance by nominating him for an Academy Award as best supporting actor. He reprised his role for the three sequels. The Karate Kid earned more than $90 million. The Karate Kid, Part II (1986) took Daniel and Mr. Miyagi to Okinawa, but other than bringing Miyagi's personal story into present time and adding Japanese setting and actors, it did little more than repeat a formula that had proven successful. Nevertheless, box office receipts topped the previous movie, reaching $115 million in domestic grosses and making it the second-highest-grossing martial arts movie. The Karate Kid, Part III (1989) earned only a fraction of the first two and ended Daniel's role. Mr. Miyagi adopted a new mentee in The Next Karate Kid (1994). Whether the fourth movie failed because the new protagonist was female (played by Hilary Swank) or because a new audience found the formula less appealing is unclear. Either way, the minuscule $9 million grossed sent the message that it was time to end the series. By this time, however, Mr. Miya-gi's influence on the genre was established: the wizened, benign martial arts master with a touch of mystery had become a convention of the genre.

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