Last night, my son and I went to see “Birth of the Dragon.” Directed by George Nolfi (The Adjustment Bureau), this is a fictionalized movie based around the fight that changed Bruce Lee from one of Grandmaster Ip Man’s best pupils, into a bona fide martial arts legend known the world over. I wasn’t sure how risky it would be, taking my son to this movie. This would be his first truly martial arts movie he’s ever been to and an introduction to Bruce Lee. So, how did it go? Let’s dig into this! Wa-taahh!
Birth of the Dragon – Martial Arts Breakdown & Review
Any major martial arts movie release has a fairly high bar to live up to these days. We have actors like Donnie Yen, Iko Uwais, and Tony Jaa providing high-quality acting and memorable fight sequences. How did these relatively unknown actors handle their respective roles in Birth of the Dragon?
Yu Xia/Wong Jack Man
Yu Xia is a relatively unknown actor here in the U.S. and gave a wonderful performance as the Shaolin master. He was very nuanced and thoughtful in his performance. He matched that with beautiful and flowing movements in his fight scenes. I had trouble finding much information on his history in martial arts and don’t know how long he has been training. It’s almost irrelevant because he was very believable being on par with Ng’s young Bruce Lee.
Phillip Ng/Bruce Lee
Bruce Lee is one of the most easily recognizable and imitated screen presences in the history of movies and television. Through movies and TV, he introduced Americans to Kung Fu and changed martial arts forever. There have been actors before who could pull off the dramatic part, but not the physical, and vice-versa.
First thing’s, first. Phillip Ng is, hands down, the most accurate on-screen portrayal I have ever seen of Bruce Lee. He has really put in significant study time to do the late master justice. His mannerisms come off as authentic and not an over blown caricature of Lee’s unique brand of sounds and facial expressions. He portrays a pitch-perfect playful seriousness in his fight scenes with lesser foes and deadly seriousness when more evenly matched.
Phillip Ng’s portrayal of Wing Chun on-screen is wonderful to watch. He was a student of Sifu Wong Shun Leung, a pupil of Grandmaster Ip man, and influential in the training of the late Bruce Lee. Lee credited both of them with his education in Wing Chun Kung Fu. Ng displays impressive hand speed and foot work with his fight scenes, as well as fluidity in his movement. He seamlessly moves from soft-style techniques to hard striking almost imperceptibly.
Going forward, Phillip Ng should be the first option for anytime Bruce Lee needs to be on-screen, for anything. I hope to see him in more movies going forward. He has significant martial arts and acting skills, which is not very common in movies and TV these days.
Birth of the Dragon Movie Review
There was a lot of controversy surrounding Birth of the Dragon, ever since it premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival with an unfinished cut, according to the director. Complaints about ‘white-washing” and Bruce being relegated to a side-role in favor of the character of Steve McKee were rampant long before the nation-wide release today. Bruce Lee’s family have also publicly distanced themselves from the movie. Were any of these concerns and complaints valid?
Story
Director George Nolfi has not been shy stating that Birth of the Dragon is a fictionalized Kung Fu movie, and not a Bruce Lee biopic. Phillip Ng has likened it to the “Ip Man” movies. These were highly dramatized re-tellings of the life of Grandmaster Ip Man.
If that is what they were going for, they largely succeeded. This movie is a lot of fun to watch, with pacing being fairly good in the first and third acts. The second act was slightly chunky while moving the individual pieces into position. The story has obvious elements of “lessons to be learned by all,” especially for Ng’s Lee. While the story is not the deepest, they did a good job of presenting what the lesson was without over-using exposition from one of the characters.
Birth of the Dragon is fairly attractive throughout. The last two major action sequences being particularly fantastic while taking visual inspiration from some of Lee’s major fight scenes from his classic movies. Wong Jack Man’s visual aesthetic was beautiful in motion, a great counter-balance to Lee’s more simplistic attire, and used to great effect.
The fight scenes were captured in a lot of wide shots with some close-up work. Fast cutting of the fight scenes was kept to a relative minimum, especially during the fight the movie is based on. This is a testament to the skill of the two main actors. Fast editing is often used to hide low skill of the principal actors, and to swap in stunt doubles. Phillip Ng and Yu Xia were easily observable on-screen throughout a significant portion of their fight scenes. Wire work (or wire-fu) was kept to a minimum, with only a few obvious instances of use.
Billy Magnussen/Steve Mckee, and other criticisms
Ahhh, Steve! Did you really take over the whole movie and push Bruce Lee to the side? In a word: No. Billy Magnussen plays the role of Steve McKee, a student of Bruce Lee at the open of the movie. Early critical reaction centered around his role being too large and side-lining Bruce Lee in the process.
I will start by saying that I have no idea what the unfinished cut (the directors claim, not mine) looked like, but the reaction was harshly critical. Whatever they did between then and now, I have no idea. I can only speak to what my son and I watched last night. What I saw was only one white guy who desperately needed two legendary Kung Fu masters to help him in more ways than one.
I say “only one white guy” because he is the only non-Asian actor featured in any significant way throughout the movie. Without spoiling anything, he is instrumental in getting the two masters to agree to a duel, but he is never portrayed in an overly glamorous light. Only Lee and Wong Jack Man’s characters are presented that way.
The characters of Bruce Lee and Wong Jack Man, together or separate, are on-screen for at least seventy-five percent of the movie. While the movie was not set up to show this moment in Lee’s life through his eyes, it never felt as if he was anything but a co-lead with Wong Jack Man. I honestly felt as if Steve’s character was simply used as a catalyst and had a “man among gods” feel. There were a few spots where his presence or dialogue was a little annoying, but thankfully that’s all.
Conclusion
Bruce Lee is very clearly portrayed as a young man, full of ego and bluster. However, he still has moments of the wisdom we know from his later on-screen performances and writings. This movie makes no secret that it takes place before Lee went on to create Jeet Kune Do, become a worldwide movie star, and grow into the legend we all now know.
It’s not perfect movie. However, if you like martial arts movies or are a fan of Bruce Lee, you should enjoy Birth of the Dragon.
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I haven’t worked up the courage to watch this one yet. The fact that they portray Wong Jack Man as a Shaolin Monk who comes from China to fight Bruce Lee makes me cringe. I already knew that the whole “they didn’t want him to teach white people” wasn’t true but after reading Sifu Rick Wing’s Showdown in Oakland the legend feels more and more cheap.
That said, nice review, I might watch it one of this days.