This week in the Deep Hurting Project is a film called Fist of Fear, Touch of Death. And before I get into it, I have to talk about Brucesploitation. What is Brucesploitation, you may ask? Well, thousands of years ago, before the dawn of man as we knew him (and by that I mean 50 years ago), a young Hong Kong actor named Bruce Lee managed to make it big in the United States and start a craze in martial arts. And then, just as he became popular, he died of a combination of a cerebral edema and an allergic reaction to meprobamate. No more Bruce Lee, and worse for the Hong Kong film industry, no more Bruce Lee pictures. Except maybe if you count Enter the Dragon, which was released six days after he died, and another five films made up largely of stock footage that would be completed years afterward. This led to a shitton of companies trying to make a shitton of movies starring a shitton of actors who I'm sure were born with names like Bruce Li , Bruce Chen, Bruce Lai, Bruce Le, Bruce Lie, Bruce Leung, Saro Lee, Bruce Ly, Bruce Thai, Brute Lee, Myron Bruce Lee, Lee Bruce, and Bruce Lei / Dragon Lee in the hopes of capturing lightning in the proverbial bottle. Fortunately, at least one of these Bruce Lee actors made it big in the West, but only after he stopped trying to be Bruce Lee and started being just plain Jackie Chan. And this film is seen as the worst Brucesploitation film of all.
- And we start off with fanfare that's familiar to me, but I can't place my finger on what it is. Fortunately, it goes on long enough that I try to shazam it three times. Unfortunately, all it can give me is "Ascension" by The Beetz.
- Um, no, that touch of death thing is bullshit. You cannot just kill a person by touching them in a particular way. At least, I think that's what they're going for, since it's never explained in any meaningful way.
- That's not what misadventure means. It means an unfortunate incident, one that caused a death to occur, like, for instance, taking a painkiller that it turns out one is allergic to and exacerbates a potentially lethal condition into one that's actually lethal.
- There's also quite a bit of dubbed stock footage from Bruce Lee himself, either dubbing over an old interview with random truisms about karate or Kung Fu (they don't really differentiate between the two, let alone mention his actual discipline. Jeet Kune Do) or dubbing over an episode of an old movie he starred in, which was, unfortunately for the fans, is a serious drama based on a play called Thunderstorm. What's the quality of the dub? I'll let this clue you in.
- Self-hypnosis doesn't sound all that mysterious or elusive.
- Why the fuck does everybody think Fred Williamson is Harry Belafonte? And it's not like they look all that similar. They're black, they have short hair, and are fairly tall, but that's pretty much where the similarities end. Or was there a stage where he wore a big-ass porn moustache?
- Oh, that's right, I forgot to mention this was basically a mockumentary about a karate tournament at Madison Square Garden where people are fighting to be considered Bruce Lee's successor.
- Okay, the boxer seems to be closer to the truth on Bruce Lee's death when he mentions some swelling, even if he's still insists Bruce was murdered.
- She's got glass in the ass?
- What a coincidence. These four guys were harassing a woman in the park and the boxer just randomly went there and beat them up. He didn't even have to know what they were doing.
- This white dude was the first person who spot Bruce Lee's talents? Gee, it's almost like this movie exists as much to suck his dick as it does to lionise Bruce Lee.
- Bruce Lee's grandfather was one of the greatest Chinese samurai in the 19th century?
- We now interrupt this movie about a Chinese martial artist with these random clips from a samurai movie. Because it's not like they're totally different disciplines in totally different cultures, especially two different cultures that fucking hate each other and one had been subject to horrifying war crimes from the other well within living memory when this movie was made. Actually, looking it up, this is actually a Chinese movie called Invisible Super Chan, even if the hairstyles look far more Japanese than Chinese. Still fairly certain that it's kinda fucked to treat Chinese and Japanese culture as interchangable.
- Also, as mentioned before, they redubbed an old movie Bruce Lee starred in. One with zero fighting that's apparently based on a famous Chinese play called Thunderstorm. I guess it's a valid approach. It's like if Barbarella had an extended flashback that was just the same adaptation of A Doll's House Jane Fonda starred in and overdub it with random shit that vaguely connects with the plot of the former film, and then added flashbacks within that flashbacks to another movie set in another time that has fuck-all to do with anything.
- A black belt? Unless your dojo is just that shit, that should be something to be proud of.
- You know, if I wanted to watch a martial arts movie dubbed over with some random bullshit, I'd watch Kung Pow: Enter the Fist.
- So, this stock footage took up 33 of the first 53 minutes of this 83-minute film.
- And they went back to scenes of a random woman being sexually assaulted just so this guy can slowly walk up and kick the asses of her rapists.
- No, these guys aren't bothering me, I'm just into really rough shit in public.
- And I can totally imagine that this Asian dude with the Meathead moustache and domino mask is named Bill Louie.
- And why does she still have her arms held in the air? It's not like anybody's keeping them up.
- Yes, Bruce Lee's the #1 promoter of martial arts. I've never even heard of Aaron Banks until today.
- And this technique, never seen before in the United States is called The Reverse James Caan in Misery.
- Well, it's nice to know that Fred Williamson is greatly undermining the whole premise of trying the successor of Bruce Lee.
- Huh. Justin Whang is a record-breaking martial artist. Who knew. Okay, technically, it's Richard Barathy. I wonder if we can get him to split that nice piece of ash I bought the other day into a good size for the guitar I'm building.
- And now, we're on a random boxing match that will apparently decide the whole competition about who will be Bruce Lee's successor. Even though he barely actually boxed in his films. That said, he did briefly box and even won a single tournament.
- And even Adolf Caesar's even pointed out that this plan to find a successor to Bruce Lee is bullshit.
Comparing the Universal Oneness of All Life to Yo Mama since 2010.
I was born with the gift of laughter and a sense the world is mad.
I was born with the gift of laughter and a sense the world is mad.