Monday, November 1, 2010

Return of the Way of the Dragon (1972)

I think this got released over here after Enter the Dragon, but I am not sure.  seems likely, with the US title of "Return" used to cash in on the 1973 movie.

in Way of the Dragon Bruce, wrote, directed and choreographed the fight scenes.  it plays out a bit like the episode of the "Green Hornet" called "The Preying Mantis" (which I reviewed here a while ago) in that gangsters are trying to get the land a Chinese restaurant and sending in thugs to scare off business).  Tang Lung (Bruce) comes in from Hong Kong to help out.

it's a good movie, and Bruce's sense of humor is on display for a change.  I think he would have made some fine comedies later on.

of course, lost in the dubbed version is that Tang Lung speaks little English or Italian and can't understand a lot of what the gangsters are saying to him.  nice to have a subtitled copy now to be able to hear the difference.

the DVD is nice, except I believe it's still slightly "zoomboxed", which was a fad when DVD first came out- making the letterboxed pictured bigger on the non-anamorphic TVs back then.  it cuts off the top and bottom of pictures instead of using the actual framing the filmmakers designed for the movie.  thus many of the fight scenes look more cramped than they would in a pan and scan format.

this really is Lee's best movie, despite the higher profile of "Enter".  it's more of a martial arts movie than that one.

1 comment:

Danny Coffin said...

I liked ''ENTER THE DRAGON'',but agree that ''WAY OF THE DRAGON''(as well as ''FIST OF FURY'')had more of Bruce's martial philosophy(oh,had he lived to complete ''GAME OF DEATH'' with his original story intact...)