ShareThisIf "The Karate Kid" hooked up with "Step Up 2 The Streets," "Never Back Down" would be their love child.It's inevitable that "Never Back Down" will be compared with every fight film from Ralph Macchio's 1984 career high, "The Karate Kid," to Jean-Claude Van Damme's 1986 breakthrough, "No Retreat, No Surrender," to David Fincher's 1999 cultural phenomenon, "Fight Club." Yes, it's fueled by kung-fu fighting -- actually, mixed martial arts -- and it rehashes some plot lines from each of those films and others.But it's not a pale, sixth-generation copy of a hackneyed fight film or of the "high-school outsider earns respect" genre. Not only does "Never Back Down" sizzle with visceral fight choreography, but it also boasts capable actors who bring depth to the better-than-usually-written characters.Jake (Sean Faris) is not a happy teen. He's carrying a heavy load of guilt that often prompts him to lash out in anger. When Jake moves from Iowa to Florida with his widowed mom, Margot (Leslie Hope), and younger brother, Charlie (Wyatt Smith), all he wants is to be a face in the crowd at his new high school in Orlando.He thinks he's helping when he tries to rescue scrawny Max (Evan Peters) from a beating. Turns out that Max is training in mixed martial arts. MMA is the craze at the school, and Ryan (Cam Gigandet), with his ice-blue eyes, razor-sharp jaw and fat-free abs, is the champ at the center of the fury.Jake isn't interested in fighting, but when his schoolmates discover a video of a brawl he got into on the football field in Iowa, he's doomed. He shows up at a party to which he's been invited by Baja (Amber Heard) and learns belatedly that he's the main event, Ryan's kicking boy for the evening.Wanting revenge, Jake goes to the gym where Max trains and meets the owner, Jean (Djimon Hounsou), an MMA master who wants his students to use their skills for self-defense. Jean is long on discipline, which Jake is not, and believes that a good fighter can always control the outcome. The outcome of Jake's training and Ryan's bullying isn't hard to predict, but the journey to the climax is a real rush.Aside from looking much more mature and buff than normal high-school students, Faris and Gigandet are convincing as troubled young men in need of venting. Jake's self-doubt and Ryan's acting-out are flip sides of the same coin in this film that could be subtitled "In Search of a Father Figure."Hounsou handles Jean's baggage with further male brusqueness, though he makes the master more practical than magical. Heard plays the object of desire not with conceit but as someone aware of her failings.Screenwriter Chris Hauty may not stray from formula in a plot sense, but the characters all feel like people who were alive before the first scene was written. Director Jeff Wadlow paces the fights, drama and humor so that they complement each other without seeming too corny -- until that double-take "Step Up 2 The Streets" ending.Rated PG-13 for mature thematic material involving intense sequences of fighting/violence, sexuality, partying and language -- all involving teens.Four stars (out of five).(Contact Betsy Pickle of The Knoxville News Sentinel in Tennessee at www.knoxnews.com.)
A real kick
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