Load of rubbish!!

Better Late Then Never

A Brilliant Conflict

Actress is magnificent and exudes a hypnotic screen presence in this affecting drama.

Outside of NYC's Madison Square Garden, Adolph Caesar is told by karate expert Aaron Banks that Bruce Lee was killed by a Touch of Death. Adolph is covering the World Karate Championship inside the Garden and Bruce Lee's successor could be anoited. He is joined by Fred Williamson who is constantly being mistaken for Harry Belafonte. Using old film scenes, Adolph recount Bruce Lee's life. There are so many things wrong with this movie. It borders on being disrespectful to the dead. That's saying alot with so many Bruceploitation films floating around taking advantage of his name. This one has multiple issues. First, Bruce's dubbed voice sound foreign to the man. It sounds wrong when the man actually spoke perfect english. They obviously needed the dubbing to change some of the dialogue but they could have used a better impersonator. Second, the disrespect comes from the Touch of Death. If the movie insists on doing a conspiracy theory about his cause of death, the movie should probably drop the faux documentary production and stay solidly in fiction territory. Third, there is a constant confusion between Japanese and Chinese. While Bruce competed against other fighting styles, he was never dismissive of their cultures and he certainly never confused them. It's insulting to say the least. Lastly, the middle of the film uses scenes from other movie to portray Bruce Lee's early years and his family origins. It is a complete failure of confusion. Again there is bad dubbing. I don't follow the chaotic filmmaking. The only positive is seeing footage of a young Bruce Lee although having another guy play Bruce playing Green Hornet's Kato is a meta mind bend. I'm guessing that they couldn't license any Green Hornet footage. Despite the chaos and the incompetence, these are people who are actual friends and fans of Bruce. That is its only saving grace. They may be bad at making movies but their admiration of Bruce is never in doubt.

This ain't a film. I know it's marketed as such, but it's nothing like a movie. Instead it's the most obvious, crass, stupid cash-in on the whole 'Bruce Lee' craze you'll ever see, a semi-factual, semi-fictional excuse of a movie that makes no sense whatsoever. I can't even begin to describe the story, because there isn't one. Half of the film is a kind of documentary about the martial arts, filmed at a bout between rival masters. The other half consists of clips of old movies that supposedly tell Bruce's life and reveal his passion for kung fu.The script is absolutely diabolical and completely nonsensical. The funniest part of the film by far is the 'soap opera' retelling of Bruce's life as a child. Because Bruce actually was a child actor, appearing in loads of films like this, all they do is take various clips from a film and re-dub them to make them about Bruce himself. It's as bad as it sounds. Then, even funnier, are more clips, from a period kung fu flick – INVINCIBLE SUPER CHAN, incidentally – that are supposed to be an account of the life of Bruce's great-grandfather in the 19th century, the "best samurai in China". What idiot thinks that samurai warriors are Chinese instead of Japanese? Elsewhere we get clips of Bruce in action and plenty of interviews with the actor, where the other 'actors' in this film are added in to make it look like they're in the same room (it doesn't work). The worst bit is the part where Aaron Banks and Bruce talk about each other's techniques which goes back and forth like a tennis match. Not only is the footage with Banks modern and the footage of Bruce archive (you can easily tell by the quality), they even use a voice stand-in for Bruce on occasion. Banks is some kind of fight promoter and has zero connection with the star, while host Adolph Caesar was an Oscar-winning announcer who they roped in to add gravitas.There are a couple of clips of Ron Van Clief training at his home which allow the producers to give the star third billing, while Fred Williamson turns up in a few comedic scenes, playing himself, who keeps getting mistaken for Harry Belafonte! There's another interlude with Bill Louie dressed up as Kato fighting off some would-be rapists and then a kickboxing fight that doesn't have a lot to do with anything else. FIST OF FEAR, TOUCH OF DEATH is an absolutely awful cash-in with no artistic value whatsoever, although fans of bad films will be delighted to see just how blatantly bad it is. The only good thing about it is the decent footage from INVINCIBLE SUPER CHAN, which makes me want to track that film down...

Where to begin with this one? It's so bad, so unintentionally hilarious, in so many ways, that I am almost paralyzed with indecision about what to address first, and how to keep this review under 1000 words. OK, I know. The real problem with this film is that the writer and director were apparently on acid when they put this together. It's just a mess. Several real life celebrities play themselves; a couple of minor martial art luminaries get to act out their Bruce Lee fantasies; there's some archival footage from an early Chinese soap opera where a young Lee played a supporting part; this is mixed incoherently in with footage swiped from an old time Chop Sockey film, claiming that this footage is the back story of his "grandfather"(????). There's a Madison Square "title bout" to determine who gets to be Lee's successor (or sometimes his "title', despite the fact that Lee didn't compete in tournaments after his movie career took off,and never had a "title" that I knew about, and his "successors", if any, would be members of his Jeet Kune Do training group....none of whom appear in this film) There's several badly mangled pieces of Lee interview footage where someone dubs over Lee's actual words so it looks like Aaron Banks (or the TV announcer)is interviewing him. BTW, the dubbed speeches use the terms "karate" and "kung fu" interchangeably,and it's obvious that whoever wrote and dubbed the footage didn't know the difference.There are other extremely odd choices. Fred Williamson is in here for a bit, playing himself, and the movie wastes about 10 minutes following him as he oversleeps, tries to catch a taxi, and verbally spars with the announcer (who gives him a lift to the Square). Ron Van Clief appears (as himself) in an interview while he works out (which sort of makes sense) and then rescues a couple joggers from a gang of thugs on HIS way to the Garden (apparently the interview camera followed him out of the gym). Aaron Banks (in real life a promoter and sometime karate competitor) babbles on about the "death touch" and then demonstrates it for the camera (anyone with a smidgen of martial arts background will recognize what Banks is doing as a variant of Lee's "one inch punch", NOT a "death touch".) Some guy dresses up in a Kato costume and also rescues some girls by beating up a some thugs, and the inclusion of this footage makes so sense whatsoever in terms of the story or the milieu. Add did I mention the actual bouts? At one point one the competitors rips the eyes out of another one! I'm pretty sure that counts as a foul and a disqualification under most events that would occur at Madison Square - not to mention prison time for aggravated assault and a million dollar lawsuit. It just goes on and on like this; nothing connects to anything else, and the feeble "framing device" of the TV interviews doesn't even begin to make up for the weird stuff the producers just made up. If Bruce Lee had come back from the dead, the first thing he would have done would be to pulverize the director and producers responsible for this movie. I am very surprised that his family and estate didn't sue. The only reason to see this is a) the footage of the soap opera with the adolescent Bruce (which I had never seen before) and b)to see just how bad an exploitation movie can get.

First off the movie is an obvious comedy that knows it is being funny. It IS a funny movie that is a comment on all the fake Bruce Lee movies being done at the time. The violence is comic to start with. Scenes like the eyeballs are played for laughs. Making Lee's voice fem was an obvious joke too, as was his "Samururi" background. The black and white footage IS Bruce as a child actor. Redubbed to be satirically biographical it cuts between the old film and the 70s B Samurai movie in a direct parody of "The Real Bruce Lee". The skits are meant to be funny as are the would be attackers. Their are some real martial arts in the film by excellent practitioners and the point of the whole movie is that you should be yourself. The message is use Bruce to inspire you but be your own self in martial arts and in acting. I liked this very much it's fun cheese that doesn't take itself seriously.