Ideals vs Reality “Red Belt,” as is often the case, is not what the synopsis says. Of course, there will be jiu-jitsu and fights, but to a much lesser extent than the distributors promise us. It is strange that martial arts were chosen to display the topic, but it is so. In principle, with the same success, David Mamet could shoot, for example, artists or sculptors.
The film is not about the basic truths that honor is above money, and the pathosy finale, eloquently confirming this, leaves only a sense of incompleteness, but not certainty.
Of course, we all knew that where sports begin, martial arts don’t always end, but where money begins, even sports end.
Of course, the idea of the main character that “there is always a way out” is also banal, especially when a person who constantly repeats it as a mantra is himself in captivity of circumstances and obviously has no way out.
Of course, it is bad to compete (competitions make a person weaker, and if he gets injured, and tomorrow he will be attacked?), because the principles of the hero against fighting for money.
Yet the reality is that the world doesn’t care about principles. Moreover, principled people seem dangerous and incomprehensible to the world, and therefore he is trying to force them into the framework of the system. And you know what? He is very good at it...
People whose ideal needs are above the vital (or below, according to Maslow) are not needed. They are not necessary for business, because business seeks to reduce the risk of losing money to a minimum and is not ready to depend on the whims of fighters and fortune. Sports do not need them, because sports are primarily belts and cups, fans and advertising, competitions and victories, not the School of Life. They do not even need their own wives, who, in contrast to their “ideal” husbands, represent a system and principles appear only when there is money in their pockets.
And the system is so finely tuned that any attempts to do something that goes against the consumerism and dishonor that is going on around, lead to a sad ending. The finale, which happened much before the fight in a crowded hall. The finale, where a police officer who has just received his black belt, which is only needed to "hold his pants up," dies, only to protect his School and his teacher. The irony is that the system is so cynical that even death for the sake of principles does not bother it, and it crushes everyone who was attached to this person, leaving behind a bare reality where bank accounts are more important than human life.