Rating of
2/4
"Enter The Dragon" by Yojimbo
Yojimbo - wrote on 02/26/12
A Shao-Lin monk is recruited to infiltrate a tournament held by a corrupt martial artist to recruit new members to his organisation. Enter The Dragon was Bruce Lee's final completed film, and this reason alone was enough to make it pass into legend, and it is a monument to Lee's incredible skill and potential. If you look at the film objectively however, it's more difficult to see as a great film in its own right. Take away Lalo Schifrin's excellent score and Bruce and it's 70s exploitation pure and simple; the characters (Jim Kelly's be-afroed black power stereotype sticking it to the man and John Saxon's adrenaline junkie playboy) are cartoon characters,and the crude photography and gratuitous female nudity are all standard elements of the trashy crowd pleasing flicks of the era. The plot also does not stand up to scrutiny; did Han (with his metal hand, cat stroking and secret base making him look like a Frankenstein's monster made up of old Bond baddies) really think that holier than holy Lee whose sister's death was caused by the lascivious advances of his evil henchmen would want to throw in with him and his drug running, white slave trading buddies...? Please. The upshot of all of this is that every second of screentime devoted to anybody but Bruce is screentime wasted, and you spend ALL of it waiting for him to reappear and strut his stuff. But when he does, he is simply incredible. Worth it for Lee and Schifrin, but anyone expecting a cinematic classic will be disappointed.
