Awful

Rating: 1/10 (7 August 2008)

I've been training MMA for years now. I started out wayyy before the MMA craze, starting with Muay Thai, adding boxing, and later down the road BJJ. I've been training at Ivan Salaverry's MMA for the past year or so, a gym filled with professional REAL fighters. I've trained with Ivan, Maurice Smith, Anderson Silva, Antonio Noguera,and more.
I can say with first hand experience that this movie is everything MMA and the UFC are trying NOT to be. It's chock full of cheesy, ignorant, wanna-be fighter b.s. that will only appeal to teenage boys that want an excuse to fight. Don't give me the flimsy "but Jake didn't WANT to fight, don't you see?", this movie is bulls**t Hollywood crap made for impressionable teens. It's plot line sucked, and was much better 20 years ago when it was called "The Karate Kid".
However, it's not only the plot that makes it terrible (although it doesn't help). It's that I can't imagine how many stupid kids are going to fight each other in the parking lot because they're dumb and don't realize that this isn't at all representational of what MMA is like or even really about.
Take it from someone who's fought, trained, gotten to know some of the best there is, and watches almost everything concerning MMA with no shame (I've been to every kind of event from small local shows to the UFC itself). This isn't MMA. This is: Hollywood+ 90210+ Recycled fighting movie plot= Never Back Down, the worst waste of time for anyone over 17 with an brain (even worse if you have fighting experience).
Skip it, no matter how much of a fan you are.
If you're not a fan? Then there isn't a single reason on Earth to even spend a second wondering if you should watch this garbage.