The Sound Guy Sounds Off: Sayonara, Mr. Miyagi
As I’m sure you all know by now, actor Pat Morita died in Las Vegas this past week, leaving behind one of the most memorable movie characters I experienced during my formative years, the legendary Mr. Miyagi of the Karate Kid movies.
It’s weird how coincidences stack up sometimes. Just last month I picked up the DVD box set featuring all four Karate Kid movies and was in the middle of watching them from beginning to end when I heard about this. What made it extra weird was that I was wondering why on Earth a fifth movie hadn’t been made yet. It’s been more than ten years, and the last movie, The Next Karate Kid featuring Hilary Swank in place of Ralph Macchio, didn’t really seem to be all that well received, not to mention the problem of how exactly it fit into the canon of the Karate Kid universe. What became of Daniel Larusso? Was he running the bonsai shop? Why could Miyagi spend all that time in Boston? Whatever happened to Cobra-Kai’s Terry Silver and John Kreese, the two most bizarre ‘80s villains ever? Didn’t they still want revenge on Miyagi and Daniel? Was Silver still a millionaire, or did Barnes losing ruin him somehow? And what was up with his housekeeping staff? Did they sign some sort of non-disclosure contract where they had to keep his insane evil deeds secret? I mean, they went out and got him crappy clothes and cars so he could pose as someone who wasn’t a millionaire, all to fool Daniel. At some point any level-headed individual would bring that up at a dinner table complaining session about the boss, right? And how would his being a millionaire have affected the way Daniel looked at him? He still used his own name, and was apparently a pillar in the karate community, so why the ruse? Bah! So many questions were left unanswered, which is why I believe a fifth movie was, and still is, needed. The untimely death of Morita rules out a real reunion movie, but this franchise can still be revived.
So, without further ado, here is my set-up pitch for what would become Return of the Karate Kid:
(Fair warning: I’m gonna get really into this.)
The film opens in modern-day Tokyo, with the obligatory shots of all the nuttiness that abounds there, like robot clowns and holographic fish and young cartoon girls being chased around by giant anthropomorphic basset hounds or whatever. Just what the heck is going on over there? Anyway, we finally settle on a theater and travel inside. The theater is empty, save for people on the stage. A dozen or so young Japanese women in workout gear practice traditional dance moves, overseen by a Japanese woman in her mid-thirties, Kumiko (you know, Daniel’s girlfriend from Okinawa in part two). Kumiko coaches the girls in Japanese as the chirping of a cell phone interrupts. Frustrated, Kumiko rushes to her purse at the proscenium’s edge and pulls out the phone, flipping it open. “Moshi moshi?” she says with a slight chuckle. Suddenly, the levity drops from her face and is replaced with worry.
We cut to a darkened Tokyo apartment, not far from the theater. Our hero, Daniel Larusso, now in his mid-thirties as well, sits at a table, chopsticks in hand. We’re treated to a nifty CGI close-up of a fly as Daniel catches it in his chopsticks. Daniel looks down, grunts a satisfied grunt, and lays this fly on the table with three more dead ones. The sound of a door opening interrupts his fly-catching. He turns around to see Kumiko rushing in, slightly out of breath.
Kumiko: Daniel! You took the phone off the hook again!
Daniel: I didn’t want to be interrupted. Sorry. What’s wrong, Kumiko?
Daniel tosses the chopsticks to the table and stands, approaching Kumiko.
Kumiko: I got a phone call from your mother…it was about Miyagi.
Daniel: Miyagi?
Kumiko: Miyagi has died, Daniel.
Daniel stares at Kumiko for several seconds, finally turning away and heading back to the table. He sits down hard in the chair and cradles his head in his hands, crying. Kumiko approaches him from behind, hugging him as we fade to black.
The title card fades in: Return of the Karate Kid.
(Bam, our first five minutes of the movie are in the bag, just like that. See? Already this is better than the first five minutes of part three, which was just made up of clips from the first two movies largely centered on Kreese, who was shortly shipped off to Tahiti. Wait…huh? Ah, forget it, let’s move on.)
We fade in to an establishing shot of Los Angeles. Bagpipes are playing, punctuated by shots fired from seven rifles. We settle in on a military funeral for Mr. Miyagi, attended by a small group of people, including Daniel, Kumiko, their two children, Daniel’s mother, Louisa Pierce and her granddaughter, Julie Pierce (the last one there would require a cameo appearance from Hilary Swank, who just might do it, considering the crappy movies she’s made in between Oscars before...The Core, anyone?) The flag is presented to Daniel, and his voiceover transitions us into the next scene, Daniel talking to his mother at Miyagi’s graveside.
Daniel: I just don’t see how this was possible, ma. Mr. Miyagi took good care of those cars…
Mrs. Larusso: The police investigated it, Daniel. They said he turned around in the street in front of the bonsai shop and was on his way home. There was a train coming and his brakes failed, Daniel…he couldn’t stop.
Daniel: After all Mr. Miyagi had been through it just doesn’t seem fair for him to die like that.
Mrs. Larusso: Dying is never fair, Daniel. But Mr. Miyagi led a full life…
Something catches Daniel’s eye. Across the cemetery two men in dark suits and sunglasses stand on either side of a tree, looking Daniel’s way. Daniel takes a few steps closer, trying to place the faces. Then it hits him: the two men are John Kreese and Terry Silver, the maniacs behind the Cobra-Kai dojo.
Daniel: What the hell are they doing here?
Mrs. Larusso joins Daniel in staring at the men. She looks at Daniel, puzzled.
Mrs. Larusso: What’s wrong, Daniel? Who are those men?
Kreese and Silver laugh as they stare at Larusso. They turn and make their way toward and idling black limousine.
Daniel: Looks like just a couple of snakes.
(Great line of dialogue, if I do say so myself…flawlessly references the Cobra-Kai angle while simultaneously foreshadowing the menace the reappearance of these two will undoubtedly bring. Toot!)
Mrs. Larusso: Well, honey, let’s go ahead on home. I wanna visit with my grandkids. Oh, and you have some things to square away at the house.
Daniel turns to his mother, confused.
Daniel: House, ma? You live in an apartment. What house?
Mrs. Larusso: Mr. Miyagi’s house…or should I say your house. He left it to you.
Daniel turns to his mother, smiles a weak smile, and puts his arm around her shoulder as they walk away…
And the first fifteen minutes are in the history books. We’ve dealt with the unfortunate and somewhat mysterious death of Mr. Miyagi, establishing that Daniel thinks that his death is not quite what it seems. We’ve already made plot points out of minutiae tossed around lightly in the previous films, such as Kumiko going to work for a dance company in Tokyo and Miyagi leaving his house in California to Daniel after writing a hasty will in part two. And, by far my favorite part, we got to see Kreese and Silver return, hinting that they are still the nasty, bizarre foils to Daniel that made part three so much awful fun to watch. And are they perhaps responsible for Miyagi’s death?
It’s weird how coincidences stack up sometimes. Just last month I picked up the DVD box set featuring all four Karate Kid movies and was in the middle of watching them from beginning to end when I heard about this. What made it extra weird was that I was wondering why on Earth a fifth movie hadn’t been made yet. It’s been more than ten years, and the last movie, The Next Karate Kid featuring Hilary Swank in place of Ralph Macchio, didn’t really seem to be all that well received, not to mention the problem of how exactly it fit into the canon of the Karate Kid universe. What became of Daniel Larusso? Was he running the bonsai shop? Why could Miyagi spend all that time in Boston? Whatever happened to Cobra-Kai’s Terry Silver and John Kreese, the two most bizarre ‘80s villains ever? Didn’t they still want revenge on Miyagi and Daniel? Was Silver still a millionaire, or did Barnes losing ruin him somehow? And what was up with his housekeeping staff? Did they sign some sort of non-disclosure contract where they had to keep his insane evil deeds secret? I mean, they went out and got him crappy clothes and cars so he could pose as someone who wasn’t a millionaire, all to fool Daniel. At some point any level-headed individual would bring that up at a dinner table complaining session about the boss, right? And how would his being a millionaire have affected the way Daniel looked at him? He still used his own name, and was apparently a pillar in the karate community, so why the ruse? Bah! So many questions were left unanswered, which is why I believe a fifth movie was, and still is, needed. The untimely death of Morita rules out a real reunion movie, but this franchise can still be revived.
So, without further ado, here is my set-up pitch for what would become Return of the Karate Kid:
(Fair warning: I’m gonna get really into this.)
The film opens in modern-day Tokyo, with the obligatory shots of all the nuttiness that abounds there, like robot clowns and holographic fish and young cartoon girls being chased around by giant anthropomorphic basset hounds or whatever. Just what the heck is going on over there? Anyway, we finally settle on a theater and travel inside. The theater is empty, save for people on the stage. A dozen or so young Japanese women in workout gear practice traditional dance moves, overseen by a Japanese woman in her mid-thirties, Kumiko (you know, Daniel’s girlfriend from Okinawa in part two). Kumiko coaches the girls in Japanese as the chirping of a cell phone interrupts. Frustrated, Kumiko rushes to her purse at the proscenium’s edge and pulls out the phone, flipping it open. “Moshi moshi?” she says with a slight chuckle. Suddenly, the levity drops from her face and is replaced with worry.
We cut to a darkened Tokyo apartment, not far from the theater. Our hero, Daniel Larusso, now in his mid-thirties as well, sits at a table, chopsticks in hand. We’re treated to a nifty CGI close-up of a fly as Daniel catches it in his chopsticks. Daniel looks down, grunts a satisfied grunt, and lays this fly on the table with three more dead ones. The sound of a door opening interrupts his fly-catching. He turns around to see Kumiko rushing in, slightly out of breath.
Kumiko: Daniel! You took the phone off the hook again!
Daniel: I didn’t want to be interrupted. Sorry. What’s wrong, Kumiko?
Daniel tosses the chopsticks to the table and stands, approaching Kumiko.
Kumiko: I got a phone call from your mother…it was about Miyagi.
Daniel: Miyagi?
Kumiko: Miyagi has died, Daniel.
Daniel stares at Kumiko for several seconds, finally turning away and heading back to the table. He sits down hard in the chair and cradles his head in his hands, crying. Kumiko approaches him from behind, hugging him as we fade to black.
The title card fades in: Return of the Karate Kid.
(Bam, our first five minutes of the movie are in the bag, just like that. See? Already this is better than the first five minutes of part three, which was just made up of clips from the first two movies largely centered on Kreese, who was shortly shipped off to Tahiti. Wait…huh? Ah, forget it, let’s move on.)
We fade in to an establishing shot of Los Angeles. Bagpipes are playing, punctuated by shots fired from seven rifles. We settle in on a military funeral for Mr. Miyagi, attended by a small group of people, including Daniel, Kumiko, their two children, Daniel’s mother, Louisa Pierce and her granddaughter, Julie Pierce (the last one there would require a cameo appearance from Hilary Swank, who just might do it, considering the crappy movies she’s made in between Oscars before...The Core, anyone?) The flag is presented to Daniel, and his voiceover transitions us into the next scene, Daniel talking to his mother at Miyagi’s graveside.
Daniel: I just don’t see how this was possible, ma. Mr. Miyagi took good care of those cars…
Mrs. Larusso: The police investigated it, Daniel. They said he turned around in the street in front of the bonsai shop and was on his way home. There was a train coming and his brakes failed, Daniel…he couldn’t stop.
Daniel: After all Mr. Miyagi had been through it just doesn’t seem fair for him to die like that.
Mrs. Larusso: Dying is never fair, Daniel. But Mr. Miyagi led a full life…
Something catches Daniel’s eye. Across the cemetery two men in dark suits and sunglasses stand on either side of a tree, looking Daniel’s way. Daniel takes a few steps closer, trying to place the faces. Then it hits him: the two men are John Kreese and Terry Silver, the maniacs behind the Cobra-Kai dojo.
Daniel: What the hell are they doing here?
Mrs. Larusso joins Daniel in staring at the men. She looks at Daniel, puzzled.
Mrs. Larusso: What’s wrong, Daniel? Who are those men?
Kreese and Silver laugh as they stare at Larusso. They turn and make their way toward and idling black limousine.
Daniel: Looks like just a couple of snakes.
(Great line of dialogue, if I do say so myself…flawlessly references the Cobra-Kai angle while simultaneously foreshadowing the menace the reappearance of these two will undoubtedly bring. Toot!)
Mrs. Larusso: Well, honey, let’s go ahead on home. I wanna visit with my grandkids. Oh, and you have some things to square away at the house.
Daniel turns to his mother, confused.
Daniel: House, ma? You live in an apartment. What house?
Mrs. Larusso: Mr. Miyagi’s house…or should I say your house. He left it to you.
Daniel turns to his mother, smiles a weak smile, and puts his arm around her shoulder as they walk away…
And the first fifteen minutes are in the history books. We’ve dealt with the unfortunate and somewhat mysterious death of Mr. Miyagi, establishing that Daniel thinks that his death is not quite what it seems. We’ve already made plot points out of minutiae tossed around lightly in the previous films, such as Kumiko going to work for a dance company in Tokyo and Miyagi leaving his house in California to Daniel after writing a hasty will in part two. And, by far my favorite part, we got to see Kreese and Silver return, hinting that they are still the nasty, bizarre foils to Daniel that made part three so much awful fun to watch. And are they perhaps responsible for Miyagi’s death?
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posted by Davor Novakovic @ Tuesday, November 29, 2005
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