Bruce Lee's "The Way of the Dragon" is a good movie but at the same time it is an action movie with many major flaws, but let me be clear I'm not being generous to this movie at all. The movie was Lee's only film as a director, and he also wrote the screenplay for the movie all by himself, and he stars in it as well. The main character of the movie is about a Chinese man named Tang Lung (Bruce Lee) who comes to Italy from Hong Kong just to visit some of his relatives and there he has a girlfriend named Chen Ching Hua (Nora Miao) who works at a restaurant owned by "Uncle" Wang (Chung-Hsin Huang) who also has a lot of aspiring martial artists who work as chefs at his restaurant and their restaurant is been threatened by a local gang who wants to take ownership of the restaurant. For most of the movie I was pretty bored with the dialogue but it wasn't entirely Lee's fault because at the time he wasn't very experienced in the movie business, and this movie would happen to be one of his very first and very last movies after dying at the age of 32 on July 20, 1973. Anyway I say that in the normal scenes throughout most of the movie Lee treats this movie like a romantic type of movie so that we can get to know his character and the rest of the characters throughout the course of this movie but then again it would have been better if he had made the dialogue much more interesting instead of really boring. But now let's get back to the story. Then as the movie goes on Lee's character keeps removing the criminals from that restaurant and then the gang hires an American martial artist named Colt (Chuck Norris) in order to kill him which the only thing that I can tell you other than the two of them square off against each other is that their fight takes place in the Roman Colosseum. During the battle between the Lee and Norris characters we see a major plot twist involving his friends of which I will not reveal. The only area of this movie where this is entertaining is the scenes where the action sequences which are expertly choreographed by Bruce Lee. If Bruce Lee (who was the greatest martial artist of all time) had lived longer people highly believe that he would have become a very popular action star like Sylvester Stallone, Bruce Willis, and Arnold Schwarzenegger among many others. This movie could have been better but i'm still recommending it for those die hard Bruce Lee fans out there.

At it's heart "The way of dragon" is pretty much a B-class movie. The low budget is quite obvious in few places and the story is very thin. The plot is pretty much an excuse for the nonstop action. The characters are one dimensional .The acting isn't anything special ."The way of dragon" promises action and that's the main (if not only) reason to watch this movie. Bruce Lee is responsible for writing and directing this movie. The movie has a very nice flow and well directed action scenes. There is plenty of fights here and they are all well choreographed . The final showdown at the Colloseum is very exciting and memorable. Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris have a great fight which shows how well skilled they both are.The story has a sense of humor which is sometimes subtly shown in the movie (notice the cat watching Lee and Norris fight). It never takes itself too seriously and the lighthearted approach makes you forgive the otherwise thin storyline. There is even one good twist at the end of movie .The music is nice. The characters are black and white , good guys are likable (if not forgettable ) and the bad guys are fun like cartoon villains. Bruce Lee and Chuck Norris give the best performances in this movie. It's no Oscar worthy acting , but a very adequate performances. Norris probably gives the performance of his live here and his last scene here made me care for him and left me sad. That tells you something.After "Enter the dragon" this is probably Lee's best and well known movie. I give it 8/10.

Bruce Lee's filmography was short. A short role in "Marlowe", three Cantonese action flicks and one Hollywood venture with the near perfect "Enter the Dragon"*. "Way of the Dragon" was Bruce's only self directed work and while he'd started work on "Game of Death" he never got to finish it. His two other Cantonese films; "Fist of Fury" and "The Big Boss" were directed by Chinese pro Wei Lo who succeeded in bringing out Bruce's best when it came to his acting and, wisely, let Bruce loose when it came to choreographing the stunning fight scenes he's most known for. Although "The Big Boss" isn't very good, "Fist of Fury" is and it probably showcases best Bruce's acting and unbelievable martial arts skills. With "Way of the Dragon" Bruce wanted director's choirs and, sadly, he doesn't fare well. Taking obvious cues from Wei Lo but also influenced by American and Italian film making (my guess; Sergio Leone was a favorite of his); "Way of the Dragon" works best when simply focusing on breathtaking action and not the central story of a Chinese relative helping his kin keeping a restaurant safe from mafia enforcers. Bruce clumsily injects far too many scenes with silly and badly staged humorous sequences*. The location photographers went a little too nuts with Roman locals and the film practically slows to a halt midway through as Bruce and girl spend a day walking around the city. What drama there is is amateurishly handled and for too much over the top acting is let loose. The atrocious dubbing is among the worst I've seen and it doesn't help matters either. But the action scenes are simply sensational and ensure the film as a classic Bruce Lee flick. The one on one with Chuck Norris is legendary, the double nunchaku fight is intense and overall when it comes to fight scenes the film is impeccable. There's even a very surprising twist near the end that I didn't see coming and the dramatic ending is quite well played out. One must keep in mind how difficult and ambitious a project this was for Bruce. Only allowed to spend a limited time in Italy and with a crew that had a two week limit; it's maybe not so surprising that many of the location shoots turned out the way they did. It was a big thing for a Chinese film to be shot in Europe and there's a funny story involving the shooting in the Coliseum (extremely illegal and fast feet were required). Bruce's intentions were to bring Chinese films up to the level of American films and this was his debut feature. Taken as such; it's not at all bad. Bruce definitely would have polished his directorial skills and honed his craft even more. So we'll never know what he could have delivered but if the 40 minutes or so of footage he completed for "Game of Death" is anything to go by it would have been something special. As it stands; "Way of the Dragon" is a wholly uneven mixture of exceptional fight scenes coupled with a very rough mix of silly humor and amateurish drama (for the most part). *In the filmography listings above I left out his television credentials which of course included "The Green Hornet", "Batman", "Longstreet" and others along with many bit parts in Chinese films. *I must admit that one scene; where an opponent of Bruce gets hold of one his nunchaku's and accidentally knocks himself out is simply hilarious. I rewinded at least three times*

Actually , my personal favorite was Fist of Fury (Chinese Connection in the US) but this is also a very good movie and it seems that it was the favorite of his wife Linda Coldwell. Way of the Dragon was known as Return of the Dragon in the US and Chuck Norris must have had fond memories of this one. The illegal filming in the Colosseum in Rome must have been a very daring thing to do. The scene with the dart in a man's backside was quite funny. This was to my knowledge the only Bruce Lee film with some humour in it. The question "Is hore name Tang Lung?" (no spelling error by the way, just the accent the man was speaking) by the Korean guy is the line I think I remember best. It was Bruce's first attempt at directing and he did a very good job too.