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This is generally considered to be the best bio-pic made of Bruce Lee's life, even though it does leave some gaps in the story. Often billed as a documentary, it is in fact a movie based on the biography of the man, and it takes the high road by trying to present Bruce Lee as he really was. The film opens with the ambulance transporting Bruce to the hospital, followed by a respectful look at his gravesite, and only then do we go back in time to trace the extraordinary life of this martial arts legend. Bruce Li plays the part of the Dragon, and I was definitely most impressed by his performance. The first few Bruce Li films I watched, I couldn't understand why this man is generally considered to be the best of the Bruce Lee imitators. He impressed me in Chinese Connection 2, but Li is on top of his game in Bruce Lee: The Man, The Myth; his resemblance in both look and form to Bruce Lee is much more polished here than in Li's other films. We follow Bruce Lee from Hong Kong to Seattle, Washington, where he teaches the martial arts to those wanting to learn, having by now gone a long way toward establishing his own special Jeet Kune Do style. From here it is on to San Francisco and then Los Angeles, by which time he has landed the role of Kato in The Green Hornet. Eventually, the reluctance of Hollywood to build a movie around a relatively unknown Asian fighter leads him to return to Hong Kong to make a name for himself there. This film features a very nice reproduction of one scene from Bruce's first big movie, The Big Boss (aka Fists of Fury in the US). After a couple of Hong Kong successes, he makes his successful return to America to begin the film career he had dreamed about. He found early work behind the scenes of several movies, including one filmed in Rome which is reproduced faithfully on location in this bio-pic. The rest of his movie career is zipped through rather quickly, setting the stage for the inevitable and tragic death of this man whose legend will never fade away. The one major issue I have with the film concerns Bruce's wife and children. There are no references to his getting married or becoming a father; the wife and kids just turn up out of the blue one night to tell him goodnight. There are a number of good fight scenes in this film, largely due to the fact that Bruce Lee was constantly accosted and challenged by tough guys, martial arts "experts," and practitioners of any number of fighting disciplines wherever he went: on the street, at the airport, even on the sets of his movies. Bruce also had to endure a great deal of prejudice against his Chinese ethnicity. Heaven help anyone who put down kung fu, such as a fair number of karate experts and a number of proud Thai boxers. You would think only the most foolhardy of folks would dare challenge Lee to a fight, but there are a lot of really dumb men in the world who were taught a hard lesson by Bruce Lee. Bruce Lee: The Man, The Myth really is the best of the Bruce Lee bio-pics available, despite the fact it was released back in 1976. Bruce Li gives the finest performance of his career, and the movie strikes a respectful tone that fittingly acknowledges both the mythic qualities of Bruce Lee as well as the human side of the man. Bruce Lee was, after all, just a man (albeit an extraordinary one), and it is important to remember and celebrate his life rather than get completely caught up in the mythology surrounding his achievements and mysterious death.Read full review
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