Real Bruce Lee (1979)

Bruce Lee: The Little Dragon
The Young Bruce Lee

Cast:

Bruce Lee is Bruce Lee
Dragon Lee is Dragon Lee
Bruce Li is Bruce Li

What the box says:

Drawing on footage thought to be lost, then discovered in Chineses archives, this documentary-style film includes scenes of Bruce Lee as a child actor, a clip of Bruce with his real father acting together, and explosive performances from his first four films.

What another box says:

Bruce Lee stars in one of his earliest films, the Real Bruce Lee. This exciting 1979 action film comes to you straight from the Chinese vaults. Introducing Dragon Lee and Bruce Li performing martial arts at its finest.

Plot:

Claims that new Bruce Lee has been discovered and imitators such as Bruce Li and Dragon Lee will be featured.

The first 25 minutes or so is archival footage of Bruce Lee. As a kid, his father got Bruce into movies at the age of 7. We see a punch of kids. A pickpocket strikes. He holds a kid hostage. Bruce manages to send the cops off on a wild goose chase. The pickpocket claims to owe Bruce a favor.

The brown and white film footage of “Bad Boy” shows Bruce bullying a number of kids.

Footage from”Carnival”, a Chinese tearjerker is about a family starving has their son Bruce Lee demonstrating kung fu.

Footage from “Orphan Sam” was Bruce’s last Hong Kong movie. Creepy guys are giving Bruce cookies. Later, an escaped prisoner grabs him. Bruce helps him get out of his leg irons. Bruce is willed money for his education. Why this was an attempt at Great Expectations.

Bruce headed to US and settled in Seattle and founded a martial arts academy. After starring in Green Hornet, Bruce returned to Hong Kong for Fist of Fury, Chinese Connection, Enter the Dragon, and his final movie Game of Deathhe died while filming.

Let Bruce Lee impersonating start with Bruce Li. A Kato tribute.

My Stooge Fu knowledge of the Curl-Li manuever counters your feeble Lar-Re punch.

Back to some guys in white gis getting whaled upon.

The narrator announces the greatest Bruce Lee successor: Dragon Lee. He introduces himself by dropkicking a rock through bulls-eye target. Suddenly, a gaggle of sword wielding goons chase after the hot chick. Dragon is to the rescue and beats the goons off.

I see London. I see France...
He also learns that one of his friends has been murdered.

Yashuka, the evil Japanese overlord, controls the martial arts schools and wants to eliminate Ching Wu school.

Cartman's attempt at giving a Japanese guy a Hitler.

Elsewhere, the wizened master gives his permission for Dragon Lee to get his revenge.

Goons set up traps. Yashuka wants the peasants beaten into submission.

Dragon Lee is walking through the forest when goons pop out of the ground to attack him. Well, Dragon quickly dispatches them.

Dragon gets to the Ching Wu School that has been trashed according to Alice Cooper.

The goons try shaking down shop keepers for protection money. Dragon arrives to layeth the smack down upon them.

Yashuka is having the Chinese peasants tortured before blindfolding himself and lopping the poor guy’s fingers off.

A messenger brings a letter from Dragon to Yashuka. The evil overlord uses his extendable sword to de-pants the guy. A ninja dressed in white comes to the rescue to keep the messenger from suffering a fate out of some twisted live-action version of hentai.

The peasants are studying kung fu. Dragon doesn’t know the guy who saved the messenger. Yashuka’s aide arrives to get have Dragon agree to a treaty.

Dragon and his men arrive at Yashuka’s school to discuss conditions. Evil overlord wants to fight Dragon. The fight rages on and Dragon has to evade the retracting and extending sword. Dragon kicks a flower pot across the room and hits Yashuka.

Dragon and his men leave. They must be on guard for Yashuka’s men. The white ninja pops up again to warn them.

The hot chick is on a stroll. The wizened master tells her that Dragon has avenged them.

A new Japanese-German champion, Gruder, is to get revenge on Dragon for Yashuka.

Dragon is training his school when Gruder arrives. The champion vows they will fight soon.

Later, Gruder has the goons kidnap the hot chick to distract Dragon. The white ninja follows them and unmasks. Why the wizened master is the white ninja. Gruder will take care of him. Let the beat down ensue. Gruder isn’t able to get the upper-hand until he resorts to cheating like using the throwing blades hidden on the bottoms of his shoes, etc.

The goons attack and take the hot chick away.

Dragon learns of his master’s death and the kidnapping of the hot chick. One of his students takes him a secret room.

Elsewhere, Gruder prepares for Dragon. Hot chick refuses to write a note pleading for Dragon to save her.

Dragon sneaks into the evil lair. He is trapped in a caged room but still manages to escape. The goons have numerous traps set in the lair.

Dragon skulks through the lair and easily routs the goons.

He readies to contend with a gaggle of masked pseudo-ninja goons. Let the nun-chucking Bruce Lee impression ensue by handily defeating them.

Gruder and the Hitler looking overlord are left to face Dragon. Well, the weasely mustached overlord is defeated like he owed Dragon money. Gruder is killed by a flying flower pot. Dragon leaves the lair.

The narrator tells us that there is only 1 Bruce Lee. I guess that defeats the purpose of the last 95 minutes.

What I say:

Ah, the martial arts documentary from the 1970s, to be honest, it is more a mockumentary albeit without the humor than being realistic. Yes, another Bruce Lee documentary. Has Bruce Lee had more documentaries made about him than the number of movies he starred in? I've been warned about Game of Death already. I'm sure that my ten of fans would have expected me to have learned my lesson from Fist of Fear, Touch of Death. That was more than a year and half ago...I never seemed to learn my lesson about made for TV movies from the 1970s besides the Kolchak: the Night Stalker movies. I didn't get beyond the realm of the Third Class Wisconsin Drinking ninja by being easily scared or by making much sense.

The last 20 years of martial arts movies have continually become more and more over-stylized. The last 10 years has given us Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon and Hero among others. I missed the 70s with all the kung fu movies like Killer Meteor, Return to the 36th Chamber, Rage of the Masters, and 36 Shaolin Beads. Something has been lost by all of these highly choregraphed movies. I enjoy Jackie Chan and Sammo Hung movies. Has there been any martial arts movie like Dirty Ho made in the past few years? Has anyone tried to make an actual martial arts movie like from the 70s in the past few years?

Why the Kato impersonation in this movie isn't quite a tasteless rip-off as the one in Fist of Fear, Touch of Death. That isn't saying much. A guy dressed like a chauffer with a domino mask wailing upon a number of goons isn't a difficult scene to stage. However, it still doesn't make him Kato from the Green Hornet. Personally, I would rather see the 1960s Batman 2 parter that had Batman and Robin having to fight Green Hornet and Kato. Yes, Adam West as Batman fighting Bruce Lee. Batman versus Bruce Lee oozes of sheer unbridled ninjalisciousness. The realm of DVDs may have unrated versions of American Pie but won't give us the 60s Batman series.

There are supposedly several different version of this movie floating around. Or at least the same version that has different run times listed on some of the DVDs. I have a version that claims to be 95 minutes and another that is 108 minutes. Decided to watch what I thought was the longer version which strangely was only 95 minutes itself. I'm not going to go through the other DVD that actually had the correct 95 minute run time listed. There is a confession that needs to be made, some B-movie reviewers watch a movie 3 or 4 times. I don't. I watch the movie once and that's it. Granted, I pause a lot to take notes...

Pretty much after the 25 minute mark or so, the Dragon Lee movie footage has absolutely nothing to do with Bruce Lee. Most of the Real Bruce Lee is fight scenes from a Dragon Lee movie. The fight scenes from a movie put into a movie with a little bit Bruce Lee footage and could get any with proclaiming it a Bruce Lee documentary.

Claiming Bruce Li and Dragon Lee as successors to Bruce Lee is sort of like claiming that having the same number of arms and legs as Don Knotts makes Mr. T his successor. The 70s had so many actors trying to step into the very talented shoes of Bruce Lee. Well, directors and producers just trying to cash in on it by using some martial artists.

The Bruce Lee as a child footage didn't have anything we would think of. Anyone remember Ernie Reyes Keyes, Jr? The kid who was in several TV series and movies in the 80s as the talented martial arts kids. I was expecting Bruce Lee to be doing something like that even in his early roles. Still, there is more footage of him in this dockumentary than Fist of Fear, Touch of Death

POINT TO PONDER:
OK, a Chinese martial artist isn't a ninja. Still, a guy wearing a white jump suit and mask and jumps around doing martial arts is pseudo-ninja-like enough to count for me.

Quotable Dialogue
"Some day, kung fu will used all over the world."
"What do you think you are? A magical monkey?"
"I'm so hungry I could eat my shoes."
"Could you go for a nice fresh Chinese cookie?"
"His kung fu is very good."
Morals of the Story
People can talk without moving their lips.
A 15 pound rock can be kicked througha bulls-eye target.
Swords make wooshing noises.
Japan developed hydraulic swords that can extend and retract capable of depantsing men.
The Mashed Potato dance from the 1960s was actually a martial arts fighting move.
An Asian guy without a shirt beating dudes and screaming "wahhhhhhhhhhh" isn't Bruce Lee.