Never Back Down is a 2008 American martial arts film directed by Jeff Wadlow and starring Sean Faris and Cam Gigandet. It tells the story of a frustrated and conflicted teenager who arrives at a new high school and discovers an underground fight club there.
The film was theatrically released on March 14, 2008. It received generally negative reviews from critics, though it successfully grossed $41.6 million worldwide against a budget of $20 million. It was followed by a titular film series, which included three sequels.
Plot
Jake Tyler has recently moved from Iowa to Orlando, Florida with his mother Margot and younger brother Charlie. The move furthers Charlie's budding tennis career.
Jake's father died in a drunk-driving car crash, which classmates have taunted him about. An internet video of Jake fighting with an opponent football player in Iowa who mocks him is shared at his new school, giving him a reputation.
Initially, Jake has trouble fitting in. While walking, he sees Max Cooperman seemingly being beaten up by bullies. When he tries to intervene, Max and his friends tell him off, as the "bullying" was actually a consensual mixed martial arts fight.
Later, Jake is invited by classmate Baja Miller (whom he's interested in) to a party. There, he is unwillingly pulled into a fight with Ryan McCarthy, the school's MMA champion and also Baja's boyfriend. Initially refusing to fight, Jake snaps when Ryan jokes about his father's death. Ryan easily defeats him, and he is humiliated by a video of it circulating in the school.
Max befriends Jake, introduces him to MMA, and connects him with instructor Jean Roqua. After passing Roqua's physical tests and impressing him with his willpower, he is accepted as his student. Roqua forewarns Jake that he mustn't fight outside the gym for any reason while under his instruction. If he does, he will be thrown out of his gym. While Jake trains under Roqua, he initially has difficulty quelling his anger towards Ryan.
Baja apologizes to Jake for coercing him into a fight with Ryan, but he refuses to forgive her. When Ryan shows no remorse for the fight or his sadistic tendencies, Baja breaks up with him, to which he responds by aggressively grabbing her. Jake intervenes to protect her, so Ryan again insults him about his father and leaves.
At practice, still furious over what happened, Roqua tells him to leave until he cools off. In Max's car, Jake gets into a road rage brawl, which Max films. The video circulates the school and raises Jake's social status, agitating Ryan enough to confront him.
After roughing Jake up privately, Ryan challenges him to compete in the Beatdown, an underground fighting tournament in which Ryan is the reigning champion. When Roqua discovers that Jake has fought outside the gym, he kicks him out and tells him not to return. Jake convinces him a short while later to take him back. Roqua puts him through more rigorous training, which he uses as preparation for the Beatdown.
After a workout, Roqua confides in Jake that he is in self-imposed exile from Brazil. His brother was a skilled MMA fighter and had handily beaten a local troublemaker. The man later returned with a gun and murdered him. Their father blames him for the death.
Later, Jake apologizes to Baja for not forgiving her. They playfully forgive each other in Jake's room but are interrupted by Charlie when Baja and Jake want to have sex, and they begin a relationship. He is not interested in competing in the Beatdown like Ryan wants. However, he changes his mind after Ryan severely injures Max, leaving him on Jake's doorstep. After taking Max to the hospital, Jake talks to Roqua about participating in the Beatdown. They initially argue, but he eventually relents and reminds Jake to "control the outcome."
Jake arrives at the tournament, and he and Ryan make their way through each round, each emerging victorious. Jake makes it to the semifinals despite an injury he received in the previous match. Baja arrives to support him and tell him she understands why he insists on fighting so that he would never have to fight again. After learning that Ryan was disqualified in his semifinal match due to an illegal eye gouge, Jake forfeits, seeing no reason to continue.
As Jake and Baja attempt to leave, Ryan confronts him, and they finally fight outside in the parking lot. Jake's injuries limit him, so Ryan, at first, gains the upper hand and applies a choke on Jake. However, he escapes and knocks him out using a Roqua combination. Eventually, Jake wins the respect of his fellow students, including Ryan, and Roqua returns to Brazil to reconcile with his father.
Cast
Sean Faris as Jake "The Gridiron" Tyler, a trouble-prone teenager and the main protagonist.
Never Back Down debuted in 2,729 theaters at #3 with $8,603,195 in the opening weekend. After 2 weeks in cinemas, it garnered $18,890,093; and after one month the film earned $37,676,991 worldwide.[1]
The film closed on June 5, 2008, after 84 days at the North American box office with $41,627,431 worldwide against a budget of $20 million.
Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 22% based on 83 reviews, with an average score of 4.4/10. The site's consensus states: "Though not without its pleasures, Never Back Down faithfully adheres to every imaginable fight movie cliché".[3] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 39 out of 100 based on reviews from 22 critics, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[4]
Gregory Kirschling of Entertainment Weekly gave the film a D, calling it "dopey. And with its emphasis on stupid violence, xylophone abs, and getting yourself on YouTube, it's yet another product that makes you feel bad about today's youth culture".[5] Michael Phillips of Chicago Tribune gave the film two out of four stars, saying "[i]t's a little Karate Kid, a smidge of Fight Club (with none of the ironic ambivalence toward violence that David Fincher brought to that story), a lot of The O.C. (evil boy Gigandet played an evil boy on that series), and presto: probable hit".[6]
Richard Roeper gave the film a positive review: "I laughed so much at the litany of clichés that I finally had to admit I was entertained from start to finish by this cheesy knock-off".[7]
Movie historian Leonard Maltin cited the picture as "A wildly improbable and cliched, yet entertaining (particularly for fans of this genre), variation on The Karate Kid...wherein Faris and Heard have the Ralph Macchio and (respectively) Elisabeth Shue roles, while Gigandet (who can glare with the best of them) is in William Zabka's...All in all, the film Showdown tried to be".[8]
The trance track played, when Ryan and his dad argue, is called "Estuera – Tales From The South (Jonas Steur's Flow Revision)", it did not feature on the soundtrack. It's from the album In Search of Sunrise 5: Los Angeles – Tiesto.
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Never Back Down: No Surrender, is a 2016 martial arts film, directed by Michael Jai White, from a script by Chris Hauty, based on an original story co-written by Hauty and Jai White. It is the sequel to Never Back Down 2: The Beatdown (2011), and the third overall installment in the Never Back Down film series. The plot picks up two years after the events of the second film, with the former MMA champion Case Walker is on the comeback trail to become champion once again. Produced by Craig Baumgarten and starring Jai White, Josh Barnett, Gillian White, Steven Quardos, Nathan Jones and Esai Morales. The movie was released on DVD on June 7, 2016.
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