Ed's Review Dot Com

China Central Television (CCTV)

Kwok-Kwan Chan, Michelle Lang, Ted E. Duran, Hazen MacIntyre

This was a TV series in China.  I think it was about 50 episodes.  The show was trimmed and made into a 3 hour 3 minute movie and an English sountrack (dubbed) and English subtitles are available if you want to listen to the original Chinese soundtrack.

This is the life story of legendary martial arts – Movie/TV star Bruce Lee.  Bruce was born in San Francisco, spent his youth in Hong Kong, and returned to the US.  He dedicated his life to the study of martial arts, and it is well known that he annoyed the Kung Fu enthusiasts in China who did not like the fact that Bruce was sharing their secrets with foreigners by teaching Kung Fu to students in the US.  But Bruce actually realized that no style of fighting was the perfect discipline.  Each had strengths and weaknesses, so he spent his time studying all types of fighting and bring the meld of all the styles into his own form that made him easily able to defeat people far bigger than him. 

He also made a series of movies that made him world famous.  Of course, Bruce died very young and there were many theories and rumors about how he died and whether it was murder. 

This film is not perfect.  It’s long, a few minutes over 3 hours, but considering the vast amount of footage they had to edit, it had to be hard to limit it to 3 hours.   It also has some facts that may not be exactly right.  Bruce’s celebrity led to many stories and it must be difficult to sort the truth from the legend.  But I belive they tried to do their best in this film, and if you are a fan of Bruce’s work, it a must see.    All in all, I really enjoyed it.  “Way of the Dragon” was one of the best films I’ve ever seen (includes Bruce’s whipping of Chuck Norris in the Colleseum in Rome).

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