My how this final film of Bruce Lee's has received many mixed reviews! Oddly enough, this is the only film of Lee's to have not had a title change during its viewing in the states. Game of Death is widely remembered for Bruce Lee's death on the set. From what he died of is a mystery and another topic all together. Moving on to the film... Like Enter the Dragon before it, Game of Death was an American made film with a higher budget than Lee's previous films. The plot focuses on Bruce playing a movie star (ironically) who is being tempted by mob bosses to participate in crooked deals. Of course Bruce refuses to do so and a result he is threatened along with his girlfriend. You can almost guess the rest of the plot from there. Notice I said 'almost', because the final half-hour of this movie is a big turning point from the overall plot. The game of death is a tower in which a fighter must compete to the top by winning against an opponent in each floor of the 5-level tower. This footage features non-stop kung fu till the very end of the film. So why the mixed reviews? Well, everything up to the last third of the movie is not relevant to the tower scene. This is not to say a big portion of Game of Death is boring, it just doesn't add much in terms of character development. Also, since Bruce died before it's completion, some Game of Death scenes featured Bruce Lee look-a-likes to compensate for uncompleted footage. While I can understand these complaints, what else did the producers have to work with? As for the good, Game of Death still entertains. Even if you decide that this film doesn't interest you, at least forward to the last 30-40 minutes to see some excellent choreographed fights along with who Bruce goes up against in the final fight scene. Note: the UK and Hong Kong Game of Death editions have restored a good portion of footage that was removed from the U.S. version because of time constraint.
Review of Game of Death
