Fist of Fury

Bruce Lee's second Hong Kong film

After The Big Boss in 1971, Bruce Lee reunited with director Lo Wei and Raymond Chow's Golden Harvest. Fist of Fury opened in Hong Kong on 22 March 1972 and immediately beat The Big Boss's box-office record, with HK$4.43 million. Worldwide takings are estimated at 100 million dollars on a budget of about 100,000. In France, where it opened on 2 August 1973, it sold more than three million tickets.

A real master, an invented hero

Huo Yuanjia was real: he founded the Jingwu Athletic Association in Shanghai, and his death in 1910 fuelled many rumours. Chen Zhen, on the other hand, is fictional. He became one of Hong Kong cinema's most revisited heroes: Jet Li plays him in Fist of Legend (1994), and Donnie Yen in a 1995 TV series and later on the big screen in Legend of the Fist.

Fights designed by Bruce Lee

Bruce Lee designed the fights himself, with Han Ying-chieh. They break with the choreographed swordplay of the period: fast side kicks, short combinations, shouts, eyes locked on the opponent. The dojo scene, where Chen Zhen takes on every Japanese student alone, is famous for its nunchaku work. Quentin Tarantino reused it in Kill Bill, swapping the nunchaku for a sword. Robert Baker, who plays the Russian Petrov, was a Jeet Kune Do student of Lee's. A 17-year-old Jackie Chan is among the stuntmen: he is the one who crashes through the window in place of Suzuki, the dojo master.

What a practitioner will see

Practitioners will recognise the basis of the Jeet Kune Do Lee was formalising at the time: a mobile guard, distance management, straight strikes and economy of motion. The fights are readable and fairly realistic for 1972, shot in wide frames that show whole combinations.

Reception

American critics in 1972 found it naive, and Variety saw little commercial future for it in the US. It has since been reassessed and holds an 83% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes. For newcomers to Bruce Lee, it sits between The Big Boss and Way of the Dragon, before Enter the Dragon.