Game of Death (1978)

Director: Robert Clouse (w/ segments by Bruce Lee and Sammo Hung)

Cast: Bruce Lee, Yuen Biao, and Kim Tai-jong as "Billy Lo", Gig Young, Colleen Camp, Robert Wall, Dean Jagger, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Chuck Norris (stock footage)

Country: Hong Kong

Production Company: Golden Harvest

Rating: R

Run Time: 100 minutes

From 1971 to 1972, Bruce Lee starred in three of the best martial arts films of all time (The Big Boss, Fists of Fury, Way of the Dragon). After Way of the Dragon, Bruce immediately began production on his newest film, The Game of Death. While working on the film, Bruce received an offer from America to come to the U.S. and to star in the biggest budgeted martial arts film of the time, Enter the Dragon. Therefore, Bruce suspended production on The Game of Death and went to America to film Robert Clouse's Enter the Dragon. The plan for Bruce was to film Dragon and than return to Hong Kong to complete The Game of Death. Unfortunately, Bruce died of cerebral edema before being able to continue his work on the incomplete film and was pronounced dead at the age of 32 in 1973.

After Bruce's passing, The Game of Death was taken over by Dragon director Robert Clouse (now retitled Game of Death). He shot numerous scenes, reworked the script, and used body doubles and stock footage to stand in for the actual Bruce Lee. Even though I am sure that Clouse and Golden Harvest had the best of intentions with honoring Bruce, Game of Death is a lousy mess of a film. None of the acting is any good, all of the action scenes are decent in comparison to Bruce's actual work, and the attempts to convince the audience that the "real" Bruce Lee is in the film is preposterous. And yet, all of these things make Game of Death a horrible but enjoyable mess of an action film. I know some action fans disown this film and consider it an insult to Bruce Lee. And in all honesty, those fans are completely right. Why try to create a new film with body doubles that also uses old footage of a deceased actor? However, if you can overlook that insult and look at it as an honest but laughable attempt to complete Bruce's final film, than you will have a great time watching it.

"Hey! It's Bruce...wait."

Game of Death opens with an awesome title card sequence that makes you think you are about to watch some kind of lost James Bond film. Unfortunately, it's just Game of Death. The film opens with stock footage of Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris fighting from the end of Way of the Dragon. Apparently, this footage is a new fight scene that actor Billy Lo is shooting. After Billy Lo completes the fight, a light falls and almost crushes him. Lo quickly finds out that gangsters are threatening his life because they want to sign him to their entertainment company. When Lo disagrees, the gangsters try to kill him on the set of his next scene (which is just more stock footage from Fists of Fury). After getting shot by an actor, Billy stages his death and convinces the public that he is deceased. The film even uses actual footage from Bruce Le's real funeral to portray this! 

Now that Lo has convinced the public he is dead, he decides to go after the gangsters who threatened him and his girlfriend's life. He even dons a "very convincing" beard to disguise his identity from the gangsters and their many henchmen (including Way and Enter the Dragon's Robert Wall). This plan doesn't really make much sense but we might as well go along with it. The film finally becomes exciting when Billy fights a bunch of motorcycle riding henchmen in a warehouse. This action scene leads into the actual footage that Bruce Lee shot in 1973 in Hong Kong. The real Bruce Lee works his way up a multi-leveled restaurant and fights a new henchman on each level. It's something straight out of a video game and it's the real highlight of the film. Bruce continues to work his way up the building until he takes out each and every henchman and gangster he can get his hands on.

"There's the real Bruce...with a superimposed towel around his neck."

I normally don't go into as many plot details as I just did but Game of Death has no real spoilers. It's an attempt at completing an incomplete film anyways so it's not like the plot was going to blow your minds away. I admire Clouse's attempt at trying to work the original footage into this new film but the whole film is just a mess. Every time the film cuts to a close up of Bruce Lee and tries to pass it off as footage from the current fight scene, it looks terrible. It's really distracting when the film shows a close up of Bruce Lee from a previous film and than cuts to a shot of the stand in actor who clearly is not Bruce Lee. I really thought about how they could have saved this film and I came up with two answers.

1) Don't use any stock footage or any real Bruce footage until the very end of the film. This way the entire film looks like a new movie even though it is clearly not the real Bruce Lee until the very end.

2) Don't film any new footage. Simply charge a lower ticket price and show the original yet short amount of footage shot and edited by Bruce Lee. This way, people can see the last pieces of the very last movie that Bruce ever worked on and appreciate the little work that he left us with.

This half-assed attempt at using stock footage, superimposing heads and towels onto an actor, using stand in actors, shooting actors from behind their head, using footage from Bruce's actual funeral, dubbing in dialog whenever a character's face isn't shown, and combining it all with footage of the actual Bruce Lee can't be taken seriously. However, all of this also makes Game of Death one of the most interesting action films ever made. It's not often that we get a film as baffling and chopped up as this. It's a glorious mess and I enjoyed every second of it.

The real corpse of Bruce Lee actually makes an appearance.

Stand in actors Yuen Biao and Kim Tai-jong try their best to emulate Bruce Lee but fail miserably. They seem to have Bruce's mannerisms down during the fight scenes but can't emulate his charm or personality during the dialog and dramatic scenes. Bruce wasn't just an action powerhouse. He was a funny, charming, and lovable screen presence that few action icons have been able to match. The horrible wigs, sunglasses, and fake beards that the stand ins wear are also laughable. Especially the beard! What were they thinking?

Almost every newly shot actor in the film is either decent, bad, or really bad. The worst offender is Billy Lo's girlfriend played by Colleen Camp. Even though she looks adorable, her screaming, crying, and yelling comes off as hilarious and over the top. All of the American villains are pretty weak too. My favorite was main villain Dr. Land. He's an old unpredictable man who enjoys feeding little fish to his killer scorpion fishes. He continually asks throughout the film, "What about Billy Lo? What's going on with him?" It's so funny whenever he asks this, I can't get enough of this guy. It's as if he has no clue what is going on even though he has ordered his henchmen to attack Billy numerous times.

There are several notable supporting players in the film. Robert Wall has a pretty large role as one of Dr. Land's best henchmen. He and Billy Lo have the best newly shot fight scene for the film in a locker room and it shines thanks to some great slow motion editing and solid choreography. Wall had previous fights with Lee in Way of the Dragon and Enter the Dragon so it makes sense that his big fight scene would be a solid one. Legendary martial artist Sammo Hung (Eastern Condors, SPL) even gets to fight Wall in an organized match in a boxing ring. The fight has nothing to do with the plot but it's a great showcase of action and it's always great to see a young and plump Sammo do his thing. James Tien (The Big Boss) also appears in some of the original footage from 1973.

David vs Goliath

The best acting and performing in the whole movie takes place in the footage actually shot by Bruce Lee. Bruce is as lovable and bad ass as ever in these short 11 minutes of action packed greatness. Bruce gets to fight three different henchmen and each one has a different fighting ability. The first one fights using red nun-chucks, the second fights with just his fists, and the third is the towering Kareem Abdul-Jabbar. Each of these fighters possess a unique personality and shine in their few minutes of screen time. The fights here are some of the best fight scenes in Bruce's career, especially the one between him and Kareem. It's a shame the film was never properly finished because these excellent fights would have gone great with the originally intended film.

All of the action that Robert Clouse shot for the film ranges from decent to excellent. As I stated before, the two fights that Robert Wall has are very good. The other standout action scene is the big motorcycle fight in the warehouse. It's an extravaganza of slow motion kicking, jumping bikes, and henchmen flying into cardboard boxes. This is easily the best action scene of the film shot by Clouse. John Woo must have gotten his love for motorcycle driving henchmen from this film (check out Hard Boiled, Hard Target, Black Jack, Mission Impossible 2, and Paycheck).

The most iconic aspect of the entire film lies in Bruce Lee's yellow and black track suit. This track suit has appeared in numerous other martial arts films (High Risk, Shaolin Soccer, Kill Bill Vol. 1, and City Hunter) and stands as Lee's most memorable costume from any of his films. The yellow track suit is homaged to this day and has appeared in comic books, music videos, and even video games.

More slow motion would have been appreciated.

I think you could classify Game of Death as a "Bruce-ploitation" film even though it contained brand new footage of Bruce Lee at the time of its release. It's definitely playing off of Lee's success and fandom and uses other actors who try to look like "Bruce Lee." The poster should have advertised the other stand in actors because it's unfair to solely advertise Bruce Lee as the star of the film. Not counting stock footage, Bruce is only in 11 minutes of new footage.

It is most unfortunate that Bruce Lee was never able to complete The Game of Death as originally planned. The original plot deals with Bruce and some friends trying to discover what is located atop a large pagoda. To get to the top of the pagoda, Bruce and friends have to make their way through the henchmen who appear in the 11 minutes of real Bruce Lee footage in Game of Death. Bruce had originally planned to film scenes with Nora Miao, Robert Wall, George Lazenby, Shih Kien, Bolo Yeung, Sammo Hung, Yuen Biao, Betty Ting, and even Jackie Chan! It's a shame Bruce passed because I would have loved to have seen this line up.

For those who are curious, the original surviving footage of The Game of Death can be found on the Enter the Dragon DVD. It is in the middle of a documentary on Bruce's life. The footage is as originally intended by Bruce and not the way it is found in Clouse's Game of Death. I highly recommend all action fans seek out these surviving minutes of the film because they are better on their own than the entirety of this film.

Will the real Bruce Lee please stand up?

Robert Clouse's Game of Death is a mish mash of three things: stock footage of Bruce Lee, about an hour and 30 minutes of newly shot material by Clouse, and 11 minutes of footage from Bruce Lee's originally intended The Game of Death. It all adds up to a mess of a film but it's darn fun to watch. You'll find yourself laughing at the ways the filmmakers thought they could convince the audience that Bruce Lee is in the film whether it be through stock footage or actors standing in for him. Underneath it all, Game of Death is a silly, dumb, and serviceable 70's action thriller with lots of martial arts in it. Even though it's not very good, I am going to recommend this film. It's such an unbelievable piece of cinema that you have to check it out in order to believe it. Bruce Lee's original intact footage is amazing and honestly the only thing worth watching. However, a group of action fans might have a hoot checking out the whole movie. 

Rating: 6/10 - A mess, but a fun mess. I wonder how great the film would have turned out if Bruce hadn't passed away.

Franchise:

Game of Death (1978, dir. Robert Clouse)

Game of Death II (1981, dir. See Yuen-Ng)