The Final Game of Death

The producers of this rendition wasted their time on this vanity project of his, ego ridden, poorly paced and unexplained philosophical trash. The worst dubbing since Fist of Fury. It ought to have laid dead and buried like its director, producer and star. Had it been completed, this would be masterpiece has nothing of the pace and martial arts acumen of Enter The Dragon. It would surely had been his first failure and one almighty flop at the box office. The fights are too long and drawn out, leaving nothing to quicken the pulse. The audience desired pace and dynamism from this man. It is a blistering letdown. It would've been better he scrapped the whole thing and left the genre to fade like he knew it would.

Clearly expalined why bruce lee is that sucessful not only in his martial art but also in the movie making capturing the audience and striving for perfection with his innovativeness. The amount of underlying meaning and reasoning is that great.

It contains much of slow progress, you do not feel bored but the monotone makes it drouzy.

The amount of work and dedication Bruce Lee has put into it is just admirable.

Love how the moviemakers not only deconstructed the meaning about the movie but also focusing on the things what happening outside the movie making. The events, the reasoning why delays or days of filming and who the cast is formed. Makes it really enjoyable to watch.

When I first heard about this special feature of how it contained all the footage shot for Game of Death. All the multiple takes etc, and that also with no sound. I thought to myself that it would be one boring tiresome thing to watch. Boy was I wrong! Kudos to the team who put this together. It was brilliant! The music they used to score the background of all the footage and takes was a evocative rendition of themes from Bruce Lees previous movies, which was really haunting and emotive and fit perfectly.

Seeing all this footage, some for the first time in 50 years was also thrilling.

The new credits they produced were also amazing and really made you feel that this was how the credits would have probably looked like.

Sadly the downside was the awful dubbing for the final edit. It is really bad. So bad that each time someone spoke it took me out of the movie. Also the voiceover for the new introduction scene with the projector was beyond ridiculous, and sounded as if someone was putting on a fake racist accent. Also the lack of the classic John Barry theme during the final fight scenes is sorely missed. It's just not the same without it. Hopefully one day someone can edit all the footage properly and do it real justice. (Game of Death Redux 3.0?)

Arrow Video's Bruce Lee at Golden Harvest set has been an absolute treat to anyone, fan or not, and an easy contender for the best physical media release of the year, from the long-lost Mandarian Cut of The Big Boss to this. The Final Game of Death puts the definitive stamp on what could have been Bruce Lee's greatest film and the ultimate expression of martial arts philosophy. As tempting as it might be to skip the preceding 3-hour long documentary to see the newly assembled representation of Game of Death, it would be doing James Flower, Brandon Bentley and company a major disservice for the sheer time and dedication they've put into crafting one of, if not, the finest piece of ever assembled for a home video release.

Covering everything known about the filmmaking process, behind-the-scenes issues, subsequent shooting and ultimately unfinished journey Lee's last film undertook, incorporating all 2 hours of the previously found and recently rediscovered footage from his original shoot, it expresses many of his philosophical beliefs in their purest form. From casting to filming to endless delays, there's no doubt Flower and Bentley know their stuff. There's even time dedicated to covering the contractual hand ties that lead to the 1978 film, Clouse's unfortunate handling of an impossible situation and how it kept alive Bruce's undying gift with many filmmakers and craftsmen still taking cues from him and his films to this day.

It's with this build-up that Flower then proudly introduces the newly crafted presentation of Game of Death, one that adheres to showcasing a representation of what would have been possible at the time. Utilising stock Golden Harvest sound effects, Joseph Koo's musical cues from Lee's past movies, newly shot footage to provide a contextual prologue, a new voice dub and a brilliantly animated title sequence crafts the most accurate intention to Lee's original work. No one will ever know for certain how Lee had intended Game of Death to originally play out but The Final Game of Death makes it known that no matter the representation, the legacy of both it and its tragical fallen star will always endure.