User Reviews

As with a lot of the Chinese fung fu movies from this era, this film goes under many different names. To add to the confusion, there were two different movies, from the same year, both starring Bruce Li, and both focusing on an autobiographical story of Bruce Lee. Because of this confusion, about half the reviews for this title are reviews of one movie, while the other half are reviews for an entirely different film. In fact, it's so confusing that even imdb has melded the two films together, so that a separate page for the OTHER movie doesn't even exist. I am not making this up. It's difficult to explain this but, here it is; if you saw a movie where Bruce is a waiter who serves a dish loaded with pepper, to a group of abusive morons in a restaurant, and there is a screaming, whining little kid who wants to be a Kung Fu fighter, than you have seen "A Dragon Story." If you saw a more straight forward biography of Bruce Lee, that documents his life by showing him going from a waiter to an actor to an action star, than you were one of the lucky ones to have seen "Bruce Lee: A Dragon Story." Lucky because that one is the superior film. The former movie is just sub-standard, generic fare that doesn't attempt to tell anything about Bruce Lee. Rather it just presents a character who happens to live in San Francisco and just happens to be a waiter, who after a power struggle with a rival gang, opens his own school. Basically little more than a showcase of some (admittedly spectacular) fight sequences. Of course this is important, but for viewers who want a decent story to accompany the action, this one is strictly generic and forgettable stuff. And that screaming little kid has way too much screen time, and is very irritating and corny. Like a lot of other people here, I was searching for the other movie, the one that features Latin martial artist Charles "La Pantera" Bonet, from "Black Dragon's Revenge" and "Death Promise." When I see this movie I will return and create a separate review for it. As a fan of Bronx native, and first Latino Kung fu star, Charles Bonet, I am looking to see all of his films. He's in the OTHER "Story of the Dragon." I hope this clears up some confusion.

NOTE: This review is for BRUCE'S DEADLY KUNG FU aka BRUCE LEE'S SECRET. The previous one I wrote below was for BRUCE LEE: A DRAGON STORY. Apparently, lots of Bruce Li's films have several names for some reason....

Hmm, this movie's is in middle of the road. Sure it's nothing as sloppy as FISTS OF BRUCE LEE, but not up there with CHINESE STUNTMAN or BRUCE LEE: TRUE STORY. Poor jobless Bruce is down on his luck looking for work. The restaurant scene has Bruce utilizing the Deadly Pepper attack. Very odd. Bruce kills time working out at home much to the dismay of his friend. The biggest laugh in the film comes when the two try to avoid their neighbor referred to endearingly as the `Dragon Lady'. Bruce becomes Bruce the Box Mover and is berated by a toddler. You've got lots of scenes of thugs pulling the "run away!" technique and scenes of dojos, storage docks, and lots of low budget locations. Carter Wong shows up and actually plays a decent role.

Overall, BRUCE LEE'S DEADLY KUNG FU is not bad, but not Bruce Li's best. Will Bruce sell out to Mr. Grace? Who is the guy wearing that FABULOUS cape? See it yourself to find out.

This review is for BRUCE'S DEADLY KUNG FU aka BRUCE LEE'S SECRET. This is the one where he is a waiter at the beginning of the movies, 3 guys at a table hassle him and another employee, he pours lots of pepper on thier chicken, and a fight breaks out.

The movie is cheesy, the fight scenes mediocre, and the acting is poor. Add in many annoying characters such as the woman who owns the restaurant, the children of the shipyard owner, a very whiney kid, and buffoonish rivals and the film just drags on.

If you are looking for a biopic this is not it. No accurate information about Bruce Lee. It is basically a play on his name to sell a bad movie.

In this film we see Bruce Lee wanna-be Bruce Li tackle an army of thugs(who just happen to look like a bunch of bad rejects from a 70s Disco special) lead by Mr. Grace(who just happens to resemble John Travolta if he were fat and had a scar on his face). The fights are pretty good but seriously lack credibility. In any case, this movie is very humorous to watch but the humor isn't of the intentional type. Good fun if you like this sort of thing.

Bruce Lee's death caused a large enough shadow on the kung fu martial arts movie world that, for some obsecure reason, film-makers wanted to continue making films that "had" bruce lee in them - for their own ends.

Of course this lead to disastrously bad Bruce Lee imitators (i.e. Bruce Li, Dragon Lee, etc) that would some regard as just lambasting and insulting to the Bruce Lee name - fortunately there was one Bruce Lee imitator (Sammo Hung) that would make a film worthy of Lee himself in the film "Enter the Fat Dragon".

Anyway, to this film. Firstly, if you've seen The Big Boss and/or Way of the Dragon you'll soon draw parallel's to the plot and the general feeling that you've been seen it all before.

I won't go into the plot, because basically its the same as Way of the Dragon (hero works in resturant that is taunted by some big boss type karate school with all the racial stuff thrown in).

The general 70s cliche of bad kung fu movies is apparent throughout this film, you don't know whether to laugh or cry at the clothes, the acting and the dialogue. Perhaps the worst possible example is the fact that every other character (barring a majority of the chinese) are called bob - I'm not kidding!

Admittedly, the fight sequences aren't too bad - but when you consider the only person to make a dent to the hero is veteran Hong Kong Bad guy Hwang Jang Lee you have to question the sanity of this film...why bother remaking way of the dragon when its already done?

Now of course there are silly moments throughout the film which beggers belief - why does Bob 'Bruce Lee' (the hero) who knows of Bruce Lee's paradigm of "kung fu is like running water" only become to remember of it when he's beaten. Not only that, as soon as Bob finds out what the secret is, he becomes Bruce Lee - doing war cries, doing that thing with his nose - all because he's discovered "kung fu is running water!"

Another example is this: Bruce Lee tried to step outside kung fu's barriers (this is why he wore the yellow/black jumpsuit in Game of Death) and would follow that philosophy - yet Bob 'Bruce Lee' dresses in a typically traditional kung fu styled uniform and fights the big boss bad guy who wears trainers...

Anyway, philosophy aside, this is a very bad film that tries to cash in on both Way of the Dragon and The Big Boss - the highlights are no doubt the numerous fight sequences - however they always seem to be the same thing (i.e. bunch of fighters gets hurt - their teacher goes and kicks butt, but ends up half dead - his teacher/pupils go along and fight and get beat up and then their...well you get the idea)

Perhaps the humorless resturant scenes or the unintentional comedy of a small kid manages to do special tricks with a nunchaka and uses it makes it worth seeing, I dunno - I'd personally rather see the original, enigmatic Bruce Lee in action.

Overall: 1/10 (avoid...please!)

i saw Bruce lee: a dragon story [1974} and i started to cry because it disgusted me. I just read Bruce Li's mini biography on here and he stated that he won't play Bruce Lee's part because he knows he could never be him, yet i still ponder why he took the part of Bruce Lee in this film. In this movie Bruce Lee apparently is having an affair with a lady named Betty Ping who was supposedly his friend in real life. In the real world, she claimed to have never had any relationship other than a friendship with Bruce Lee so this movie is incorrect on so many levels. I hate these cheesy directors and producers who try to bring Bruce Lee back and trying to gain some money off of his death. It hurts even more because they're telling a false story about him. I mean...how do you think his wife Linda feels? She's watching a false movie about her husband having a love affair with a lady who claimed she never had a love affair with Bruce!!

This movie contains some of the best fight scenes I have ever seen. The plot is typical, but it contains twists that differ from many of the Kung Fu movies from the era. This movie is packed with fighting, and has a great range of martial arts techniques. The soundtrack is unbelievable, although impossible to find nowadays. The English translation is way above par for the era.

The DVD I purchased contained no credits, or any sort of menu at all. The editing is very shaky at times, but I'm sure the equipment in those days was very difficult to use. It appears that this movie could have been filmed anywhere, as there are only a select few scenes that actually show famous places in San Fransisco.

This movie is a must see for any martial arts fan.

The above-mentioned line is in the italian version of this involuntarily funny movie, I don't know the english or original version, but it's a no-nonsense question one of the badguys ask for. Tons of outdate fistfights between Bruce Li/Ho Tsung Tao, his companion Carter Wong (Big trouble in Little China) and tehe usual mobsters. Korean Hwang Jiang Li pops-up with a ridicolous cloak for a fight against the fake Lee.

Hey, I've seen my share of kung-fu garbage, and this film is something I wasted a good boring Monday night on. Expectingly nothing but garbage, I just popped in the tape and thought I'd just let it run. To tell the truth, it's surprisingly decent. Bruce Li is no Bruce Lee, but he's certainly the best of the imitators, and this film is one of his better moments.

Another of those bad-yet-enjoyable films. Worthwhile if you're a kung-fu / Bruce Lee fan though.

7 / 10

This film should be examined in the context of its time and the cinematic genre to which it belongs. Whether or not it adds to or detracts from the name of Bruce Lee (an irrelevant consideration), it is a fine example of 1970s Taiwan produced martial arts entertainment. Ho Chung-Tao, who actually hated the appellation "Bruce Li" was a superb athlete and accomplished martial artist in his own right. The western members of the cast were all highly trained martial artists themselves: Phil Cohen was a student of Bruce Lee in the US, Roy Horan qualified in Shorinji Kempo, Alan Ellerton expert in White Crane, Xingyi and Tai Chi, Greg Talovic a Taekwondo instructor. Thus the fight scenes were perfectly acceptable and not as unrealistic as in some films. For martial arts movie aficionados, this film is a real classic.

The man martial-arts filmmakers could never let go! How many Bruce Lee "wannabes" have there been? This time around Bruce LI explodes onto the screen portraying, who else, BRUCE (not Lee, nor Li, just Bruce)! Sure there have been many to copy the frenetic and amazing Bruce Lee - few have succeeded, many have failed. In "Bruce Lee's Secret" (as it was titled when I saw it), at least the director(s) had the sense to make it about the fighting; the more involved, the better! Bruce Li is a waiter in San Francisco, minding his own business, when, out of nowhere, American kung fu thugs want to make trouble for Li and friends. Who cares - watch this one for the plentiful martial arts action. If you are a fan of the bad dubbing found in most of these films, you will get a 'kick' out of the insanely poor vocal choices. Lots of action, lots of fun - just enjoy!

Aw man. I kept waiting...and waiting...and waiting... ...and I yelled, "That's it??"

Man, this one hurt. Like walking in the dark and ripping a fresh wound on your shin off the corner of the living room coffee table. I kept anticipating final fight or climactic scene...or someone bumping into Bruce Li and sending him into a rage by yelling, "You look nothing like Bruce Lee!!" Instead, it's like a really bad soap opera and seeing Bruce negotiate movie contracts. Will Bruce mingle well with others at the gala party? Plus, it really makes Bruce Lee seem like a two timing sleaze because he revels in his affair and has no remorse whatsoever. Besides the fun seeing Bruce do his paper route or his phony TV kung fu demonstrations, Bruce Li; you have done better.