Bruce Lee: A Warrior's Journey

Bruce Lee: A Warrior's Journey (Chinese: 李小龍:死亡遊戲之旅) is a 2000 documentary on the martial artist Bruce Lee and Jeet Kune Do. The documentary includes never-before-seen behind-the-scenes footage of Bruce Lee's life, as well as parts of the original footage of his incomplete film Game of Death, which had been left out of the film.[1]

Bruce Lee: A Warrior's Journey
Hong Kong DVD cover
Chinese name
Traditional Chinese李小龍:死亡遊戲之旅
Simplified Chinese李小龙:死亡游戏之旅
Directed byJohn Little
Bruce Lee (G.O.D. footage)
Written byJohn Little
Bruce Lee (material)
Bey Logan (additional material)
Produced byChris Ennis
Lee Taek-yong
John Little
Bruce Lee (co-producer of G.O.D. footage)
StarringBruce Lee
Linda Lee Cadwell
John Little
Dan Inosanto
Ted Hanulak
Edited byBrad Kaup
Music byWayne Hawkins
Distributed byWarner Home Video
Release date
  • 22 October 2000 (2000-10-22)
Running time
110 minutes
CountriesUnited States
Hong Kong
LanguagesEnglish
Cantonese
Bruce Lee: A Warrior's Journey
Traditional Chinese李小龍:勇士的旅程
Simplified Chinese李小龙:勇士的旅程

Plot edit

The film has five parts, the first three of which present an overview of Bruce Lee's life, including interviews of his widow, Linda Lee Cadwell, Lee's best student Taky Kimura, Hapkido Grandmaster Ji Han-jae and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, who co-stars in "Game of Death".[2] The last two parts include 23 minutes of the original footage of "Game of Death".[3][4]

Cast edit

Production edit

Five years after Bruce Lee's death in 1973, Golden Harvest used about 11 minutes of Lee's uncompleted original footage intended by him to become the film "Game of Death", completing the rest of their 1978 film using Lee look-a-likes. Twenty-three more minutes of Lee's original footage were considered lost for 28 years, until they were discovered by Bey Logan in 1999. John Little assembled these parts according to Lee's script notes, reflecting more accurately Lee's intentions.[3][2][1]

Release edit

The documentary was released on VHS and DVD by Warner Home Video. It was also released as a bonus feature on the 2004 edition of Enter the Dragon on DVD.[5] It was released with Lee's original English and Cantonese dubbing as part of the documentary.[citation needed]

Legacy edit

The dialogue of the song Be Like Water has been sampled into various Hip hop and Electronic Dance tracks and has been mentioned in academic works.[6][7][8]

The Story edit

Bruce Lee's enacted storyline for The Game of Death, directed in Korea by John Little, distributed with the documentary in DVD as special features.

References edit

  1. ^ a b Ed Gross (2 September 2016). "Bruce Lee: new series, lost adventures". Empire. Retrieved 27 May 2017.
  2. ^ a b O'Hare, Kate (30 June 2002). "Kareem Abdul-Jabbar reveals the truth about Bruce Lee". Lawrence Journal-World. Lawrence, Kansas. Retrieved 27 May 2017.
  3. ^ a b Almar Haflidason (9 October 2001). "BBC - Films - Review - Bruce Lee A Warrior's Journey". BBC. Retrieved 6 January 2011.
  4. ^ "Bruce Lee: A Warrior's Journey". topdocumentaryfilms.com. Retrieved 27 May 2017.
  5. ^ Andy Patrizio (24 May 2004). "Enter The Dragon: Special Edition - IGN". IGN. Retrieved 13 November 2015.
  6. ^ "A Warrior's Journey - Be Like Water". www.whosampled.com. Retrieved 24 May 2017.
  7. ^ Kato, M. T. (2007). From Kung Fu to Hip Hop: Globalization, Revolution, and Popular Culture. New York: State University of New York Press, Albany. pp. 7, 178. ISBN 978-0-7914-6991-0.
  8. ^ Jump cutting: tracing parkour as invisible spectacle through the filmic city, page 10, O'Brien, S., University of Canterbury, 2011 thesis_fulltext.pdf (1.264Mb)

External links edit

(Wayback Machine copy)