Finishing the Game: The Search for a New Bruce Lee

Just watched this movie in a company of friends and got extremely disappointed with it. I first saw a trailer a couple of months ago and though it was a great premise - yes, a little goofy and maybe too post-modern for it's own good, but at least it seemed that it was a fun thing to watch.

The premise of the film is simple and is shown to you on the first minute of the movie - Bruce Lee dies while filming "Game of Death", he leaves behind 12 minutes of footage that a studio producer is willing to exploit. They start a nation-wide search for a double, so that they can film "the rest" of the movie. And so enter the bunch of hopefuls wishing to take the place of the master or just get a first acting job.

The jokes are tongue-in-cheek, but the problem with them is that they are simply not funny. The whole movie is filmed in a pseudo-documentary style that has become a most overused technique in the last 10 years of independent movies. The situations and plot lines are sometimes cute, but mostly predictable and definitely not intelligent enough. The story actually looks like a long episode of "Office" (the US version), and you have a twitch to start channel surfing instead.

I'm not sure how many Bruce Lee fans are still out there, but this film has very little to do with his work and just takes the premise and runs with it - unfortunately the end result is bland and devoid of any creative spark.

I was at Park City and have to say aside from a few films, it was quite a downer. Most of the films valiantly tried to explore serious topics but felt self important. After the intensity of seeing a couple of these films earlier in the morning, FINISHING THE GAME, a lighthearted spoof was the perfect movie to let out some tension via laughter. Director Justin Lin skillfully takes aim at racial stereotypes and the ridiculous nature of the movie biz, mocking everyone from door to door salesman to the diligent Asian med students. Lin's actors, many of whom he has previously worked with, inhabit the world he has created perfectly. Among others, there's Roger Fan as "Breeze Loo", the B-movie star who is perfectly delusional; Meredith Scott Lynn as casting director "Eloise Gazdag", the character you'd love to hate; and Sung Kang as "Cole Kim" the over-eager bumpkin" actor vying for the part. The costume design adds a wonderful visual element to the piece, and I take my hat off to all who had to don the Bruce Lee-esquire jumpsuits. Overall, it was everything it set out to be.

I am not a particular fan of the martial arts genre or a Bruce Lee idolizer, but I absolutely loved this movie. The fact that it is billed as a comedy and is actually funny, and this one is very funny, underscored for me its subtle ridicule of Hollywood, their formula films and the entire assembly-line style of film making. Hollywood seems to treat Comedy as the Miscellaneous category - if you can't categorize it as a drama, a documentary, suspense, horror, action or history, then it must be a comedy. This one is genuinely funny, instead of yet another billed "comedy" that's really just one more money-grubber's yawn fest.

This is also a wonderful but gentle poke at the entire 70's style of film and television, re-creating the tasteless idiocy of that decade's mainstream entertainment offerings, but in a manner that remains nostalgic, affectionate and respectful - like having an old hound dog that stinks just a bit and slobbers all over everyone but we still love him anyway.

If you enjoy the Christopher Guest parody movies (I don't; I respect the effort but it's just not easy to get a laugh out of me - yet this movie got plenty) I think you will find this well worth seeing. Even the nudity is so blatantly gratuitous it qualifies as parody.

If you're fed up with the standard crappy focus-group-oriented film-by-formula usually offered, you'll like this movie. If you want a good laugh, you'll like this movie. If you have a pulse and a sense of humor, you'll like this movie.

I had high hopes for this film (after reading some of the positive reviews). I was sadly disappointed. Most of the characters were supremely boring. There were some introductions to the main replacement Bruce Lee characters, but none of them seemed in the least bit interesting. I really, really tried to give this movie a chance, but it never really came through on any level. The action scenes were lame (I suppose they were supposed to be funny, but they weren't). The in depth character analysis just didn't work, other than to prove that this movie was shot on such a low budget. (Was it ever in theaters?) I think there was one funny scene, but I can't recall what it was (it was close to the end that's all I can remember). The one redeeming aspect was that most of the actors didn't completely blow it – they seemed somewhat better than most porn stars. (I know that's not much, but it's better than nothing).

"You've offended me, you've offended my family!" I just cracked up so hard that my tears just rolled out of my eyes. If I were to tell you that this is one of my best experience at the SIFF to date, then you would probably think I'm out of my mind, unless of course, you've watched this movie. Actor Dustin Nguyen was on hand to introduce the movie since he had a bit part and is one of the invited guests to the festival for the Vietnamese film The Rebel, he shared that this film is actually director Justin Lin's labour of love. Those of us in Singapore would be familiar with Justin's previous movie, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift (admit it, you have the Teriyaki Boyz set as your ringtone), and is now currently in production with FF4 (with the return of Vin Diesel and most of the original cast).

Finishing the Game sets itself in the wake of Bruce Lee's death, where the production of The Game of Death got hung up, pending how to move the film forward. As we now know, old footages of Bruce from previous movies, and stand-ins were used to try and complete principle photography so that it could still be released and audiences could lap it up when it is all Bruce Lee the master himself taking care of things up along the pagoda. So herein lies the premise for Finishing the Game, as a mockumentary looking for the next possible Bruce Lee stand in.

And the process of doing so is genuinely hilarious, playing to various stereotypes and a throwback to the cheesiness (in hindsight of course) of the 70s with the diverse group of actors and actor wannabes turning up for casting and auditioning. In fact, every character featured has a likability factor, and you can't help but to laugh along, and laugh at them. The major favourite of mine is Breeze Loo (Roger Fan), a two-bit Asian actor who's a dead ringer for Lee, and the name being a mimicking of the various "Bruce Lee" incantations that erupted in the video-movie market with Lee's demise, each starring in various action movies copying Lee's signature movements.

Watching the "spaghetti" type productions starring Breeze Loo, never fails to bring on rip-roaring laughter from the audience, and the thing is, it's pretty fun! Sung Kang stars as a happy-go-lucky, always smiling Cole Kim, a struggling actor who can't shake off his smiley face, and Raja (MOusa Kraish), who thinks he's half/Chinese. Dustin Nyugen's own role in the movie, Troy Poon, is yet another actor in a fictionalized spoof of 70s detective movies. His role in Golden Gate Guns has to be seen to be believed, and that one-liner of his about doing other people's laundry, makes him a one-liner hit wonder.

But it's not all fun and laughter throughout the movie, as underlying it is a very keen look at the Hollywood of the 70s, where "coloured" folk often get sidelined, or cast to play the villains, bit roles, supporting characters and the likes, I mean, a television series like "Kung Fu" with David Carradine in the lead, speaks volumes It's not all that serious actually as it skirts around these issues, but you get the point real quickly, about discrimination and unequal opportunities.

All in all, it split my sides good enough for me to warrant a DVD purchase once it's out (has it?). And oh yeah, see if you can spot rapper MC Hammer in it too!