Though moderately successful at the box office, The Karate Kid Part III received generally negative reviews, with criticism aimed at its rehashing of elements found in its two predecessors, though Griffith's performance as Silver received praise from some critics. It was followed by The Next Karate Kid in 1994.
Plot
Following the events of The Karate Kid Parts 1 and 2, John Kreese is broke and destitute. He visits Terry Silver, a fellow Green Beret who has become a toxic chemical magnate. Silver vows to personally help him re-establish Cobra Kai, while getting revenge on Daniel LaRusso and Mr. Miyagi. After sending Kreese to Tahiti for a vacation, Silver hires national karate champion Mike Barnes — known for his vicious personality and utter lack of sportsmanship — to challenge Daniel at the next All-Valley Tournament.
Returning to Los Angeles from Okinawa, Daniel and Miyagi discover that the South Seas apartment complex has been sold and demolished; this leaves Miyagi unemployed and Daniel homeless. With Daniel's mother Lucille nursing an ill uncle back in New Jersey, Daniel moves in with Miyagi. Daniel also uses his college funds to finance a bonsai shop for Miyagi, who gratefully makes him a partner in the business. Visiting a pottery store across the street, Daniel befriends the sole employee: Jessica Andrews, whose aunt owns the store. Jessica agrees to a date that same night, during which Daniel learns that she is visiting from Columbus, Ohio, where she already has a boyfriend. She and Daniel remain cordial.
While Miyagi introduces Daniel to kata training, Silver introduces himself to them, mentioning that he and Kreese were stationed together in South Korea during the Vietnam War. Silver announces that Kreese has passed away and apologizes on his behalf.
Accompanied by Silver's goons Dennis and Snake, Barnes repeatedly harasses Daniel and Jessica. They wreck Miyagi's shop, and steal his entire stock of bonsai trees. Daniel decides to dig up and sell a valuable bonsai, which Miyagi brought from Okinawa, in order to replace the missing trees. Barnes and his two henchmen appear. They force Daniel to sign up for the tournament, by trapping him and Jessica at the bottom of a cliff. Daniel accepts Silver's offer to train him for the All-Valley, after Miyagi refuses to do so on principle.
At the Cobra Kai dojo, Daniel is subjected to a brutal training regimen which takes a massive physical and emotional toll on him, while further alienating him from Miyagi. This culminates in a now-aggressive Daniel attacking a stranger, who was bribed by Silver to provoke him. Daniel makes amends with Jessica as she prepares to go home. She encourages him to patch things up with Miyagi, which he does.
Returning to the Cobra Kai dojo, Daniel informs Silver that he's changed his mind about competing in the All-Valley. Silver discards his ruse and brings out Barnes to attack Daniel, whose escape is blocked by Kreese. Miyagi arrives; he effortlessly defeats Barnes, Kreese, and Silver, then agrees to train Daniel for the All-Valley Tournament.
On the day of the tournament, Silver reveals his plan to re-establish Cobra Kai as a business franchise. In the finals, Silver has Barnes torture Daniel by alternately scoring points and spending them via illegal strikes. The match ends in a draw, necessitating sudden death overtime. Severely pummeled, an uncharacteristically-fearful Daniel wants to quit, until Miyagi insists that Daniel's best karate is still inside him. Daniel perseveres and performs the kata. He scores on Barnes to win the All-Valley, foiling Silver's revival of Cobra Kai.
Robert Mark Kamen had originally wanted The Karate Kid Part III to be a prequel with the two main leads still involved. The original plot would have involved Daniel and Mr. Miyagi traveling to 16th century China in a dream and meeting Miyagi's ancestors.[4][5] Kamen envisioned the sequel to resemble a Hong Kong-styleWuxia film, and would also have a female protagonist.[5] However, the producers balked at the idea and Kamen was reluctant on rehashing "the same story all over again"; he only returned after the studio agreed to pay him substantially more.[4]
After Robyn Lively was cast as Jessica Andrews in The Karate Kid Part III in 1988, producers were forced to modify her role of protagonist Daniel LaRusso's new love interest because Lively was only 16 at the time of filming and still a minor, while Ralph Macchio was 27 (although his character Daniel is 17). This situation caused romantic scenes between Jessica and Daniel to be rewritten so that the pair only developed a close friendship.[6] Although he plays a Vietnam veteran who is roughly 20 years older than Daniel, Griffith is actually a few months younger than Macchio.[7]
John Kreese was initially intended to have a larger role in the film, but due to Martin Kove's filming schedule conflicts with Hard Time on Planet Earth, the character of Terry Silver was written into the script.[8]
The film featured the same crew from the first two films, except for two key people: executive producer R.J. Louis, who was replaced by Sheldon Schrager, and cinematographer James Crabe, who was forced to pull out due to the AIDS virus making him severely ill at the time, was replaced by Steve Yaconelli. On May 2, 1989, Crabe died from AIDS at the age of 57; the film was dedicated to his memory.
Release
The film was released in the United States on June 30, 1989. In the Philippines, the film was released on September 6.[9]
Critical reception
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 15% based on 33 reviews and an average rating of 3.8/10. The website's critics consensus reads: "Inspiration is in short supply in this third Karate Kid film, which recycles the basic narrative from its predecessors but adds scenery-chewing performances and a surprising amount of violence".[10] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 36 out of 100, based on 12 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[11] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.[12]
Roger Ebert, who praised the first two films, did not enjoy Part III.[13] His colleague, Gene Siskel, also did not recommend the film, though he commended the performance of Thomas Ian Griffith, which he thought was nearly enough to save it.[14] Critic Kevin Thomas of the Los Angeles Times stated that "writer Robert Mark Kamen gave director Avildsen and his cast too little to work with".[15]
Caryn James of The New York Times was critical of the lack of character development for the film's protagonist, saying that he "has aged about a year in movie time and hasn't become a day smarter" and criticized the film for having "the rote sense of film makers trying to crank out another moneymaker".[16]
A 2008 DVD review of the film from Scott Weinberg of the website JoBlo said it was the installment of the series "where the wheels started to come off", remarking that it "approaches the Karate Kid formula as if it's the world's last home-cooked meatloaf", deriding the "cartoonishness" of the villains, and saying that "it all feels cynical and hollow...which is NOT the vibe we still get from Part 1".[17] Reviewing a 2001 UK DVD of the film, Almar Haflidason of the BBC praised the disc's picture and sound quality, but dismissed the film as a "desperate continuation of The Karate Kid franchise [which] shudders to a pathetic halt" and criticized its loss of "any warmth of the previous two films".[18]
In 2015, director John G. Avildsen called the film "a horrible imitation of the original...hastily written and sloppily rewritten",[19] adding that it "will baffle those who haven't seen the first two (movies) and insult those who have".[20] Ralph Macchio was also disappointed with the film, stating that he "just felt for the LaRusso character; he never seemed to go forward", and that when doing The Karate Kid Part III it "felt like we were redoing the first movie as a sort of cartoon, without the heart and soul which sold the original. It didn't help that we had characters mysteriously popping up for the sake of dramatic convenience."[21]
