Especially when it happens twice in one day.

I had sworn, sworn, sworn not to watch the new karate kid movie. I liked the old one a lot, and was badly traumatised by The Next Karate Kid, which was lousy despite having a blonde female karateka. There was no way I was going to erase the iconic image of Daniel-Son from my head.

But yesterday I stumbled into the newer film on UTV while doing my bi-annual dish-washing ritual. I caught it partway through, when Jaden was busy playing with his jacket, and the jacket thing was a lot more fun than ‘wax on, wax off’ so I watched a little longer.

By the time I noticed Jaden himself, I was hooked. I’ve always had a crush on Will Smith, and Jaden is so much like him. They have this little-boy-lost look that totally does it for me. It’s like a permanent hand-caught-in-the-cookie-jar expression. And I don’t know if it’s the looks or the gestures, but everything he did reminded me of his dad. I kept wondering if I’d have noticed those expressions if I didn’t already know who Jaden was. It’s like when you’re told two people are related and you suddenly notice just how much they resemble each other.

I’ll say this: Jaden being just like Will proves Will is a great dad. Jaden has so many of Will’s cute gestures and habits, and he could only have learned them by watching his dad. A lot. Or by chilling all day with Fresh Prince reruns. Either way, I’m guessing Will spends a lot of time bonding with his boy, and that’s the mark of a good father.

My favourite scene in the movie is when they’re at the dance machine thingie – I forget what it’s called – and the girl with funny hair is pulling Fergie-Beyoncé moves and Jaden is looking at her like that. I’d give a whole lot to have a guy look at me like that. Sigh. The boy may have the makings of a player though, because that expression is way too mature for a 12 year old.

The scene with the girl and the snake is pretty cool too. It’s funny when he tries to pull the move on his mother, and again in the match finals. And the black mother attitude totally made my day when she barked, ‘Pick up the jacket!’ She was rocking that red Chinese dress. Also, Jackie Chan is way more fun than Miyagi. He has this cheeky look that I adore, even though I barely knew him under the crazy moustache.

My second surprise of the day was How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days. When it first came out, I decided not to watch it because I saw the preview and noticed that I’d done every one of those crazy things. And that was just the preview! How depressing. Yesterday I caught it during the bet scene, and continued watching because nothing else was on … and because I was still doing dishes. What.

I like the movie because despite being utterly insane, she still gets the guy in the end. Of course I kept wondering if he secretly liked the craziness or if the bet was that important to him. The whole movie is told from her perspective, so we see her secret looks when she feels bad for torturing the guy, but we never really see how he feels about it.

And I like that he comes after her in the end, not the other way around. The hair was pretty too.

So. Twice in one day. I still hate being wrong though.