He does so to protect the school and the students. The dojo decides he must leave the school forever, and never return. Lee returns to see the carnage that is left in the dojo, and thereby realizes that he was the indirect cause. After being stomped on the back for several minutes, the student is crippled. For example, after the Japanese dojo springs an attack on them, one of the Chinese men tries to protect the teacher’s picture, the last remnant of their deceased master. Sometimes the greatest moments in a fight is through absence of action. Not every action scene has to win the audience over through action. But the story behind it is all that matters. The battle is fine, but not great (sometimes you can tell when fights are sped up and other parts you can tell that the actors don’t know what they are doing). This leads to an all-out fight between both schools. Regarding the latter two reasons, Zhen wants to show that the Chinese are not weak, but the consequences show that problems cannot be won through violence.īecause the Japanese dojo was beaten, they retaliate against the other dojo. What makes this scene special is 1) the overall arc of the fight, 2) why Zhen is there in the first place, and 3) the foreshadowed consequences of Zhen’s actions. The fight was very lop-sided (but less so than the ending fight). Zhen destroyed his opponents with ease, including the second-in-command teacher. The same does not speak for the other when everyone is kicking out of everyone’s finishers. Not to say that nothing compares to the old, but when one of the old-school wrestlers threw a punch, the audience felt it. It’s like comparing a classic wrestling match, such as Ricky “The Dragon” Steamboat vs. It’s hard to say that any fight today competes with a Lee fight, because the blows don’t mean as much. He not only plays the fights so well, but executes them even better. That’s a big reason why I, as well as many others, love Lee so much. For example, when one of the cocky warriors tries to show how tough he is by attacking Zhen, Zhen thwarted him by repelling the attack and knocking him down. Unlike most fights, Lee doesn’t throw a million kicks or punches, but when he does, it is a death blow. What Lee always did was make every blow count. When the battle started, the fighting was intense (true to Lee’s form). Also, Zhen knew exactly what to do-take everyone’s legs out. By scanning corners, having eyes behind his head, and outsmarting the opponents, Zhen showed that he had more knowledge than any of them. Zhen is the one with the weapon, and he utilizes it well. This, to me, is one of the few believable army-on-one fight scenes. We also are introduced to the nunchaku-a trade mark of Lee’s in later films. Many movies have paid homage to this scene, including Fist of Legends, Ip Man, Kiss of the Dragon, Ip Man 2, Hard to Kill, and many others. Bruce Lee versus the dojo: this was the first time we had ever seen one man take on an army. Fist of Fury adheres to this rule (not counting the shovel hit) after the 30-minute mark, what arrives is the defining moment of Lee’s character. To paraphrase Alfred Hitchcock: you need to bore the audience for the first thirty minutes, and then hit them with a surprise. Lee is a simple man who is caught in between a race war, and who does something to help his people. Sure, he plays the amazing martial artist like his other movies, but he doesn’t have the same status as he does in the others. From the start, we realize that Lee is playing a different role from that of any of his other films. Stunned, Zhen tries to uncover the body, but is hit in the head by another student with a shovel. One of my favorite parts of the film starts with Lee’s character finding out about his teacher’s death. The film starts off with simple narration to set up the story. Zhen later realizes that fighting may have been the end to his life. But, as with all Bruce Lee films, with violence comes consequence. He demonstrates by not only defeating the boss, but also everyone inside. As a result, Zhen decides to show the dojo that Chinese men are not weak. Set in World War II, Fist of Fury is about a young martial artist named Chen Zhen, who finds out that his teacher was poisoned by the rivaling Japanese dojo. The film was the start of his legendary career and began the character that we all know as Bruce Lee. Every year, I watch my favorite movie - Fist of Fury-at least once, preferably on his birthday. For my whole life (23 years) I have sat in front of the television, drawn by Bruce Lee’s way of thinking and way of being.
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