Enter the Dragon would be Bruce Lee’s final film completed before his death and would premiere less than a week after his passing. The film blends martial arts, action, comedy and blaxploitation genres seamlessly.
Lee’s character in the film is conveniently also named Lee and is tasked by the British secret service to go undercover and help expose a man named Han, who is supposedly involved in drug trafficking and position on his island located just off the coast of Honk Kong. Lee’s entry to the island if through a martial art tournament hosted by Han that invited fighters for all around the world. Before entering the tournament, Lee also discovers that one of Hans henchman was involved in the death of his sister.
During the journey by boat to the island, we meet two of the film’s other protagonists, Roper played by John Saxon, and Williams played by Jim Kelly. The film very much reminded me of early James Bond films, and not just because of the meeting between Lee and Braithwaite (Braithwaite being a British intelligence agent) being very bond-esque, the films opening theme song is similar to that of a Bond theme with its grand orchestral qualities. There are also female characters in Enter the Dragon that can be compared to the classic ‘Bond girl’ like Mei-Ling who acts as an undercover operative and Lees only contact on the island, not to mention the many women who Han offers to the tournaments competitors like Tania. Finally, we have Han himself who resembles a classic Bond villain with his prosthetic hand claw that is used as a weapon in the final fight scene.
One of my biggest struggles with the film was with the sound design, the film was shot without sound, so the dialogue and sound effects were added in post-production via dubbing and editing. There were times where the dubbed dialogue was too obviously dubbed and took me out of the film, this paired with the over-the-top sound effects, I found most of the sound in the film broke my immersion too many times to really be enjoyable.
Comparatively with the music however, I feel completely differently. The soundtrack composed by Lalo Schifrin contains funk and jazz songs, which lend itself to the blaxploitation themes the film already possesses, with Jim Kelly’s African American character Williams being one of the films leading protagonists in this made-for-American audiences’ kung-fu blockbuster. The music is at its best when it’s accentuating the fight sequences, making every punch and kick seem hard and weighty.
The performances from all the cast are good, although in some scenes I found them to be quite wooden, but I do think their performances were hindered by the dialogue being dubbed in afterwards. The action set pieces are fantastic, but too sparse for a film that considers itself to be an action kung-fu film. Bruce Lee was underused for most of the film. The final showdown with Lee and Han is by far the strongest moment of the film. The choreography of the fight and the chase sequence are strong, and results with them both in a mirror maze, where they both slowly stalk each other, getting lost and losing track of where they are. The tension slowly builds, and is a fantastic scene, the strongest in the film. But again, it disappointingly takes too long to get there.
Maybe I’m being too harsh for criticizing the plot of a Kung-Fu film, but the pay offs in the film I simply didn’t find interesting, such as the resolution for Lee’s sister, and the way Williams goes out doesn’t feel impactful either. Overall, I really enjoyed the technical aspects of this film, but the story and its pacing left me disappointed. I was excited to watch a movie that’s considered to be a classic, starring one of the most influential actors in cinematic history, but ironically this film didn’t pack a big enough punch for me.
