The Game of Death (1978)
"Game of Death" (original title)

A martial arts movie star must fake his death to find the people who are trying to kill him.

Director:

Robert Clouse

Writer:

Robert Clouse

Stars:

Bruce Lee, Colleen Camp, Dean Jagger

Cast

Cast overview, first billed only:
Bruce Lee	...	Billy-Lo (archive footage)
Colleen Camp	...	Ann Morris
Dean Jagger	...	Dr. Land
Gig Young	...	Jim Marshall
Tai Chung Kim	...	Billy Lo (as Kim Tai Jong)
Yuen Biao	...	Billy Lo (as Bill Yuen)
Robert Wall	...	Carl Miller
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar	...	Hakim (archive footage)
Mel Novak	...	Stick
Hugh O'Brian	...	Steiner
James Tien	...	Charlie Wang
Dan Inosanto	...	Pasqual (as Danny Inosanto)
Chuck Norris	...	Fighter (archive footage)
Roy Chiao	...	Henry Lo
Russell Cawthorne	...	Surgeon

Storyline

In this movie, Bruce Lee is a very famous martial-arts master who stars in many films. After an unsuccessful murder attempt against him, everyone thinks his is dead, but he's just hiding, preparing his revenge...

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Plot Keywords:

martial arts | martial arts master | revenge | actor | katana sword | 

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Taglines:

Bruce Lee challenges the underworld to a Game of Death.

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Genres:

Action | Crime | Drama | Thriller

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Certificate:

R

Details

Country:

Hong Kong USA

Language:

English Mandarin Cantonese

Release Date:

8 June 1979 (USA)

Also Known As:

The Game of Death

Filming Locations:

Hong Kong, China

Company Credits

Production Co:

Concord Productions Inc., Golden Harvest Company

Technical Specs

Runtime:

85 min 103 min (original premiere) 54 min (current existing footage) 40 min (2000 incomplete) 110 min (original premiere) 35 min (2000 incomplete)

Sound Mix:

Mono

Color:

Color (Technicolor)

Aspect Ratio:

2.35 : 1

Did You Know?

Trivia

In the film, Bruce Lee's character fakes his own death; the funeral scene includes real footage of Lee's actual funeral.

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Goofs

When Billy goes to the weapons-level, he has a blue bako stick but when the camera goes close up to when billy throws down his nunchakus, the bako becomes green

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Quotes

[first lines]
Director: Cut! Okay, that's a print. That was great, Billy! Okay everybody...
[stage light collapses, crew gasps]

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Connections

Referenced in Shotgun Stories (2007)

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Soundtracks

"Street Dance No. 2"
(uncredited)
Music by Andre Morgan

User Reviews

As Brandon Lee once said: "Game of Death has 40 minutes of footage and the rest is junk"

Before Bruce Lee died he worked on scripts for Game of Death (also known under some titles as "song of the knife")...and shot some 40 odd minutes of footage including test screenings and actual fight sequences.

The idea of the film was to make a multi-layer, philosophical film made for the chinese and eastern audience to ask the question over martial arts style

• the advantages and disadvantages of each style, as well as questioning the

need for style anyway.

The film's main plot was to be based in Korea. Bruce Lee would be forced into storming a 4 or 5 storey Pagoda which is said to hold a infinite treasure with each level guarded by a different style.

The bottom floor would be held by hundreds of Karate students (much like the ending of Enter the Dragon), the first layer would be a style under the handle of "Gate of Enlightment".

The Second layer would be the Preying Mantis with elements of Wing Chun.

The Third layer would be a Philophino style whilst the Fourth, the Temple of Gold would be held by a Hapikdo expert (though I'm not sure about this).

The Fourth layer would be the Temple of the Unknown, guarded by one Kareem Abdul Jabbar - doing an unknown style.

Whilst shooting, most of the footage was lost to the ravages of time. And when Bruce Lee died, his fans cried out for any footage to be shown as a mark of respect.

The end footage of Bruce Lee fighting Jabbar and previous footage would be cut to bits by Robert Clouse and put into a new film under the same name. The end film is offensive and shatters the whole idea of the original GOD plot and story - but then again there wasn't enough info on the film to start with.

Bruce Lee fans were in uproar...the film was a shambles, yet was commerically succesful. Most of the film had no Bruce Lee in it, or had lookalikes or even worse used Stock Footage of old Bruce Lee films and interspliced it into the film.

The DVD, whilst is good, doesn't do much to help the film - there isn't enough info on the script notes...why is there so much text, why didn't they try to recreate the scenes, the floors or even re-do the film as new?

You'd be better off not to buy either the DVD or video version unless you want to waste money or actually are a die-hard bruce lee fan.

The DVD doesn't give you much - but then again there was never much to start with. You'd be better off looking on the Internet for the original GOD scripts and info or even multimedia - as even now on the web you can see the footage that Bruce Lee shot and never got into the original DVD or movie.

Overall this is a very, very weak film with a good score and bad camera angles and discredits Bruce Lee's image so much it becomes deeply offensive and patronising to the viewer.

In fact you could argue that this film singly-handly started the Bruce Lee imitators phenomnen.

Whether the film's patronising and offensive viewpoint is the fault of Robert Clouse, Sammo Hung who directed the fight sequences and drafted in the services of two look-a-likes or even the producer Raymond Chow is unknown, but what is clear is the fact they tried. and failed.

As Brandon Lee once said: "Game of Death has 40 minutes of footage, and the rest is junk". I couldn't agree with him more.

Overall: 2/10