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Enter the Dragon (Chinese: 龍爭虎鬥) is a 1973 martial arts film directed by Robert Clouse from a story written by Michael Allin. It stars Bruce Lee, John Saxon, Jim Kelly, Shih Kien, Bob Wall, and Bolo Yeung, with Ahna Capri, Angela Mao, and Betty Chung in supporting roles. Set in Hong Kong, the film follows Lee (Lee), a Shaolin kung fu practitioner, as he is tasked with bringing down a drug and prostitution kingpin named Han (Shih). Lee enters a martial arts tournament hosted by Han to search for evidence, and winds up forming alliances with tournament competitors Roper (Saxon) and Williams (Kelly).

Plot[edit]

In Hong Kong, British intelligence agent Braithwraite asks Lee, a Shaolin kung fu expert, for help in taking down a criminal kingpin. This mastermind, Han, was a former Shaolin disciple now suspected of drug trafficking and pimping. Lee reluctantly agrees to enter a triennial martial arts tournament held at Han's island fortress to gather evidence. This case is personal to Lee: three years prior, Han's thugs—including his personal bodyguard O'Hara—had harassed his sister Su-lin into committing suicide to avoid being raped. On his way to Han's island, Lee meets other tournament competitors, including indebted gambling addict Roper, and his Vietnam War veteran friend Williams.

After the first day of competition, Lee makes contact with covert operative Mei-ling. Disobeying the nightly curfew, he sneaks into Han's underground compound, but narrowly escapes after being discovered by guards. Lee is also spotted by Williams, who had broken protocol as well to exercise outside. The next morning, Han orders his giant enforcer Bolo to publicly kill his guards for failing to catch the intruder. In the tournament, Lee fights O'Hara in a lopsided match. Outclassed and humiliated, O'Hara ignores Han's orders to concede; Lee kills the bodyguard by stomping on him. Embarrassed by O'Hara's disobedience and death, Han abruptly ends the day's competition.

Han confronts Williams over his curfew breaking, believing the latter knew the intruder. When Williams refuses to betray Lee, Han beats him to death with an iron prosthetic hand. Impressed by Roper's tournament performance, Han reveals his opium lab, prostitution ring and a jail full of prisoners to him. He divulges that the tournament was a ruse to find men capable of handling his overseas trafficking business, and proposes that Roper join his organisation. While initially intrigued, Roper refuses after seeing William's hanging corpse. That night, Lee sneaks out and manages to send a message to Braithwaite using the compound's radio room, but is ultimately captured. In the morning, Han arranges for Roper to fight Lee, but Roper refuses. As punishment, Roper is forced to fight Bolo, whom he manages to overpower and defeat.

Enraged by the unexpected failure, Han commands his remaining men to kill Lee and Roper. The pair are soon aided by the island's prisoners and the other invited martial artists, who had been freed by Mei-ling. As Braithwraite sends military help to the island, Lee fights and pursues Han into a hidden room covered in mirrors. The room's mirrors initially obscure Han, helping him cut Lee with a prosthetic claw hand. Lee smashes all of the mirrors, revealing Han's location, and kills the criminal by kicking him into a spear protruding from a wall. Outside, Roper and the other martial artists successfully defeat Han's men. Both he and Lee exchange a weary thumbs-up as military helicopters arrive.

Cast[edit]

  • Bruce Lee as Lee: a Shaolin kung fu expert and teacher who is tasked with infiltrating Han's island
  • John Saxon as Roper: a martial artist and indebted gambling addict invited to Han's tournament[1]
  • Jim Kelly as Williams: a karate practitioner also participating in the tournament[2]
  • Shih Kien as Han: a crime lord and renegade Shaolin monk
  • Bob Wall as O'Hara: Han's personal bodyguard[3]
  • Bolo Yeung as Bolo: Han's enforcer

Enter the Dragon also features Ahna Capri as Han's secretary Tania,[4] Angela Mao as Lee's sister Su-lin,[5] and Betty Chung as undercover operative Mei-ling. The cast also includes Geoffrey Weeks as British intelligence agent Braithwraite, and Peter Archer as an arrogant New Zealand martial artist named Parsons. The film also features several Hong Kong stuntmen in uncredited roles. Sammo Hung plays Lee's opponent in the opening scene, and both Jackie Chan and Yuen Wah would appear as a henchman and a tournament fighter, respectively.[6]: 9 

Production[edit]

Conception[edit]

  • The film was born from Warner Bros. producer Fred Weintraub's attempts to get Lee a starring role in a Hollywood film for years
  • Lee had tried several times to advance his American acting career
  • In January 1969, he, Stirling Silliphant, and James Coburn tried to create a film that would feature Lee in multiple roles and as fight choreographer


  • In January 1969, Lee, Stirling Silliphant, and James Coburn tried to work together on a film project that would elevate Lee's standing in Hollywood by featuring him in multiple roles as well as his fight choreography[7]: 192 
  • After the release of The Way of the Dragon (1972), Lee began to work on ideas for what would become Game of Death (1978)[7]: 226 
  • Production on Game of Death was paused, after Lee shot a reported 100 minutes of footage, when he received an offer from Warner Bros. to star in Enter the Dragon[8]
  • Fred Weintraub, who joined Warner Bros. in 1969 as a creative vice-president, had attempted to give Lee a starring role in a Hollywood film for years[9]: 167 
  • Golden Harvest executive Raymond Chow had sent Weintraub a print of both The Big Boss (1971) and Fist of Fury (1972)[7]: 230 
  • Ed Spielman, a writer who had been fascinated by kung fu, and his friend Howard Friendlander had written a script in 1970 about a Shaolin monk in the American frontier.[10]: 15–16 
  • Weintraub recalled that Spielman and Friedlander had pitched Kung Fu to him; after commissioning them $3500 to write the script, he tried to unsuccessfully convince Warner Bros. to make the film[11]
  • The head of Warner Bros. Television, Tom Kuhn, stated, "We didn't think Bruce could be a weekly television star, which is different from doing one-shot features. Although we knew he wanted it, Bruce Lee was never seriously considered."[12]: 72 
  • Kuhn stated that both Warner Bros. and ABC felt that Lee's accent, inexperience, and lack of name recognition were factors that played into him not getting the part[12]: 72 
  • Ultimately, the production team decided to cast white actor David Carradine to play the lead role of Kwai Chang Caine.[10]: 19 
  • Kung Fu was first broadcast on 14 October 1972[13]

Writing[edit]

  • Allin wrote the script in three weeks[14]
  • Knowing little about Hong Kong action films, Allin admitted in a 2023 interview that he lifted many elements from James Bond films to use in the screenplay[15][16]
  • Allin was also inspired by karate comic books; regarding originality in film, he said: "Movies are rituals [...] You don't want them to be too original. I wanted to watch Enter the Dragon and feel the way I did when I saw James Bond or The Crimson Pirate."[17]
  • Allin chose to set the film on a kingpin's tightly-controlled, secluded island to make sure guns wouldn't prematurely solve any conflicts[18]
  • Chaplin Chang stated that he read the original story for Blood and Steel and told Weintraub that it would be too difficult to shoot in Hong Kong[19]: 240 

Development and pre-production[edit]

  • Co-produced by Warner Bros., Lee's production company Concord Production, and Paul Heller's Sequoia Pictures, which was already affiliated with Warner Bros.[20][19]: 268 
  • Sources vary on why Clouse was selected[9]: 171 
    • According to Clouse, he was hired because Lee liked one of the fight scenes in his films
    • Cinematographer Gil Hubbs also echoed the sentiment, stating that Clouse's previous directorial effort, Darker Than Amber (1970), got Lee's attention[21]: 68 
    • However, Weintraub recalled that "no one else wanted to direct the picture except him."
  • Clouse hired cinematographer Gil Hubbs, who had previously worked with Clouse on a documentary[21]: 64 
  • Chaplin Chang, who had previously worked as a production manager on The Way of the Dragon (1972), was hired as the assistant director[22]
  • Weintraub, on why the production selected a local Hong Kong crew: "We were about to play their ball game in their ball park. I wanted the best of both worlds for Enter the Dragon so I got lots of expert advisors in the form of local Chinese."[23]: 108 
  • Jeff Schechtman, an associate of Weintraub's, was hired to be a production assistant for the film[24][25]
  • Lee successfully convinced Warner Bros. by the time pre-production on the film started to change the name from Blood and Steel to Enter the Dragon[9]: 171 
  • Warner Bros. were only expecting Enter the Dragon's box office returns to be similar to an average exploitation film, so they only budgeted a quarter of what they would normally give for one of their productions[26]: 59 

Casting[edit]

  • Saxon was a Shotokan karate and judo practitioner[27]
  • According to Saxon, he learned he received the role after Lee remembered him from a karate demonstration that Lee witnessed[19]: 280 
  • In a 2002 interview, Saxon recalled that he nearly refused the role of Roper due to how light the sixty-page film treatment was[28][29]
  • Saxon noted that his agent had told him that Enter the Dragon was "just a little crappy thing with a Chinese actor that nobody will ever see."[19]: 280 
  • Kelly had won the middleweight division title at the Long Beach International Karate Championships in 1971[30]
  • He had been teaching and competing in karate when he was asked to step in as technical advisor for Melinda (1972), in which he also got cast in a bit part[30][31]
  • Originally, Rockne Tarkington was considered to play Williams, but he suddenly dropped out a few days before filming was to begin in Hong Kong[2]
  • After someone let Weintraub know about Kelly's school, Weintraub went to go see him, ultimately casting Kelly as Tarkington's replacement[30]
  • Kelly claimed that originally, his character was supposed to have survived instead of Saxon's, but that Saxon's agent successfully pressured the producers to kill off the more novice actor's character instead[32]
  • Wall, a friend of Lee's who was known to be able to take a punch, had been previously cast in Lee's directorial debut The Way of the Dragon (1972)[33]
  • Mao recalled that while there was no female role in Enter the Dragon, her performance in Hapkido (1972) led to her being cast as Lee's sister, Su Lin[5]
  • Author Bey Logan reports that Han Ying-chieh, who had previously acted alongside Lee in The Big Boss (1971) and Fist of Fury (1972), tried to persuade Golden Harvest to cast him as Han[34]: 38 
    • However, Logan states that Lee was not happy with Ying-chieh for a couple of reasons:[34]: 38 
      • The amount of credit the latter took for The Big Boss' success, as well as
      • Ying-chieh under-utilizing Lee's friend, Unicorn Chan, in the choreography for Fist of Fury
  • Shih Kien, a veteran Hong Kong actor known for playing villains opposite Kwan Tak-hing in several Wong Fei-hung films, was hired as Han[35]: 154 

Filming[edit]

  • Enter the Dragon began filming in Hong Kong in January 1973[26]: 59 
  • Enter the Dragon had been shot nearly entirely MOS, with dialogue and sound effects dubbed in afterwards[36]
  • The language barrier between Clouse and the original Japanese cinematographer frustrated Clouse to the point where he asked Hubbs to step in as a replacement[21]: 66 
    • Hubbs was not able to get the script before flying to Hong Kong; he only received word that the movie would be filmed in 35 mm anamorphic format per Golden Harvest's requirements, a format that Hubbs had not shot in before[21]: 65 
    • When Hubbs arrived, he was dismayed by the dilapidated Arriflex cameras and poor lenses Golden Harvest used[21]: 67 
      • A local camera rental store offered him a couple of Arriflex 35 cameras and a few lenses
      • Despite lacking experience with Panavision equipment since it was his first studio-backed feature film, Hubbs had to successfully convince the producers to cover this additional cost
  • Heller recalled that due to the crowds that a production starring Lee would draw, filming any street scenes required them to set up a decoy camera elsewhere to fool the general public into thinking they were going to shoot there instead[19]: 272 
  • The establishing shot of the temple is of Ching Chung Koon, a Taoist temple in Tuen Mun[37]
  • The opening scenes where Lee talks to the Shaolin abbot and teaches a boy martial arts is filmed at the Tsing Shan Monastery on Castle Peak Road[38][39]
  • King Yin Lei was used as Han's palace[40][41]
  • Lee visits his sister's grave in the Muslim Cemetery in Happy Valley, Hong Kong[38]
  • The competitors board Han's boat in the Aberdeen harbour[37]
  • The shots of the mass of competitors working out outside are shot at the American Country Club on Tai Tam Road on Hong Kong Island[38]
  • In his biography of Lee, Clouse claimed that the stuntmen began to tell Lee that Wall had tried to intentionally hurt him, enraging the star; according to Clouse, he told Lee that he couldn't kill Wall, because the production needed him to complete the remaining scenes in the United States[42]: 156 
  • The final fight in the mirror room
    • Many commentators have noted its similarity to a climactic scene set in a funhouse in Orson Welles' The Lady from Shanghai (1947)[43][44][45]: 718 
    • Clouse claimed he had never seen Welles' film, but instead got the idea while shopping with his wife Ann in Hong Kong[46]
    • Hubbs also agreed with Clouse's statement: "We never looked at or discussed any other movie when working on the idea."[21]: 72–73 
    • This fight scene was not in the original script, which instead had an ending where Han was impaled by his own claw[9]: 187 
    • According to Hubbs, Paul Heller designed the set: a 20' x 30' room where one long wall facing the camera had a bunch of concave recesses lined with narrow strips of mirrors[21]: 73 
      • The concave mirrors gave off multiple reflections whenever someone walked in front of them
      • In the room's centre, a small closet housing the camera, Hubbs, Clouse, and an assistant filmed the action through a hole for the camera lens
    • Lee's ferocity during this sequence caused Shih to tell him, "Take it easy, son—this is only a movie!"[9]: 187 
  • After the production team left Hong Kong for Los Angeles, Lee continued to shoot additional footage, such as the opening scene with Sammo Hung[19]: 273 
  • Chang remarked that it was possible Lee filmed additional footage in the mirror room after the American crew had left[19]: 242 
  • Back in the United States, Wall choreographed the golf course fight scene with Saxon and a few local Tang Soo Do practitioners, including Pat E. Johnson, Darnell Garcia, and Mike Bissell[47][48]
  • According to Heller, aerial shots of Han's island were filmed by him as Chiao, a licensed pilot, flew a private plane[49]

Post-production[edit]

  • Hirshler was able to travel to Hong Kong with the film crew, where he was able to study the film's production, along with offering notes on pick-up shots throughout[23]: 114–115 
  • Hirshler: "There are many long takes in which I was told not to cut in and out with close-ups because the karate routines were so perfect. The camera ran as the martial artists did their routines, and I left it in the film as such. It was so perfect it would have been a crime to have tampered with it."[23]: 114 
  • On 10 May 1973, Lee collapsed while recording dialogue in a Golden Harvest dubbing room[50][9]: 189 
    • Lee felt unwell about thirty minutes into the recording session and left for the bathroom
    • After ingesting some hashish in the bathroom, he then fell over[7]: 243 
    • Lee was helped back into the dubbing room, but then he fainted, vomited, and started to convulse
    • Lee was diagnosed with cerebral edema at the hospital[51]

Music[edit]

Main article: Enter the Dragon (soundtrack)
  • The soundtrack was composed by Lalo Schifrin
  • Ted Ashley gave the approval for Warner Bros. to hire Schifrin for an additional $300,000[26]: 64 
  • Schifrin combined elements of classical music, jazz fusion, and Orientalist musical themes[52][19]: 277 

Design[edit]

Stunts[edit]

  • Lee, a Wing Chun practitioner, briefly uses trapping hands and straight punches in his fight with Wall's character[53]: 30 
  • Sammo Hung was brought on by Lee for a bit role as his sparring partner at the beginning of the film[6]: 9 [54]: 20 
  • Hung recalled that his fight with Lee was relatively unrehearsed, with most parts being done in one take[55]
  • Jackie Chan, who had previously worked on Fist of Fury, also worked on this film as a stuntman[56]
  • In addition, Yuen Biao, Yuen Wah (who was Lee's stunt double) and Lam Ching-ying were also part of the stunt team[57]: 77 
  • Wall recalled that Lee choreographed all of the fight sequences except for two choreographed by Wall himself: one where Roper fights on a golf course, and some establishing shots of boards being broken over O'Hara's stomachCite error: The <ref> tag has too many names (see the help page).
  • For the dungeon fight scene, Heller recalled that despite the script, Lee would collaborate with Clouse and the Hong Kong stuntmen to come up with interesting action sequences first, and then figure out how to film them[19]: 272 
  • Heller remembered that Lee performed the nunchaku sequence in the dungeon without production needing to speed the footage up[19]: 273 
  • Hubbs similarly dismissed the idea that any of Lee's footage was sped up so that audiences could see each punch and kick, as per popular myth[21]: 70 
  • For some sections of the final Hall of Mirrors fight, stuntman Lam Ching-ying doubled for Shih[58]: 221 

Visuals[edit]

  • The sets were designed by Chan King-sam (陳景森), who worked under a pseudonym[59]
  • Heller said that comic books, in particular the vibrant colours of Terry and the Pirates, helped shape the visual look of the film[60]
  • Hubbs claimed that the production team did not reference other martial arts movies for Enter the Dragon, admitting that he had never seen one prior to working on the film[60]
  • Hubbs stated that all of the exterior shots were filmed with simple lighting, as there was no additional lights nor grip equipment available[21]: 67 
  • Hubbs remembered that filming Han's banquet was difficult due to the banquet hall set's primitive and unreliable lighting[21]: 71 
    • Said that it was composed of bare wire, and there were no C-stands or grip equipment for lighting fixtures
  • Wall recalled that for his character O'Hara, the production team tried various beard styles before settling on the final look in the film; to add to O'Hara's threatening presence, they added a fake facial scar[61]

Release[edit]

Context[edit]

  • In the later summer of 1972, Warner Bros. had a massive hit in the blaxploitation film Super Fly (1972), which helped save the company from near-bankruptcy[62]: 16 [63]: 24 
  • Warner Bros. selected King Boxer (1972, re-titled Five Fingers of Death) for distribution, releasing it in the United States on 20 March 1973 and having it top the charts for a week[64][26]: 46 
  • On May 16, 1973, Fist of Fury, Deep Thrust, and Five Fingers of Death were listed as the top three films on Variety's weekly box office charts[63]: 20 [7]: 256 

Box office[edit]

  • It was released on 17 August 1973[65]
  • Hong Kong fans were annoyed by the decision to release the film worldwide before releasing it in Hong Kong[66]: 120 
  • They also disliked that Raymond Chow raised ticket prices from HK$5 to HK$8 (equivalent to HKD$75 in 2020)[66]: 120 
  • Furthermore, they were rankled that Lee's character worked for the British, and considered the character "a white man's stooge"[66]: 120 
  • In his biography of Lee, Clouse remarked on how the Western perception of martial arts as an exotic fantasy was polar opposite of Chinese audiences, who were irked by the inaccurate portrayal of their culture: "Many of the weapons and uniforms used offended the Chinese purists. However, it didn't 'read' wrong to Westerners because they don't know the difference."[42]: 152 
  • It was released in Japan on 22 December 1973[67]: 36 
  • As the first Bruce Lee film released in the country, it helped change the indifferent attitudes of the Japanese towards Hong Kong cinema[68]: 138 
  • Japanese distributors began importing more Hong Kong films, which helped facilitate the popularity of future Hong Kong stars like Michael Hui and Jackie Chan, and filmmakers started producing their own kung fu films[68]: 138–139 

Reception[edit]

Critical response[edit]

  • Contemporary reviews
    • Gene Siskel, Chicago Tribune, 1/2 a star: Enter the Dragon "is one of the most hateful films in years. Its story is a shameful copy of Dr. No. Its dialog approaches the infantile. Its characters are cruel parodies of human beings. Its subliminal message⁠—the only bad killer is the clumsy killer⁠—is morally bankrupt."[69]
      • Criticized the commercialized aspect of being advertised as "the first American-produced karate film" - "In addition to the obligatory Oriental, the film features a white man and a black man in heroic roles."
      • In general, Siskel viewed martial arts films unfavourably - described the story as "a flimsy excuse" for the action; critical of the "ludicrously loud, electronically-produced" sound effects that play with each punch and kick
      • Disapproved of the amount of the violence in the film, believed the fight scenes began to blur into each other; concluded that "an hour of that can be most depressing"
    • Pauline Kael: "Bruce Lee and John Saxon in a kung-fu movie that's a good-natured example of the pleasures of schlock art."[70]
      • Commented on the film's structure: "There's so much going on that the whole history of movies seems to be recapitulated in scrambled form. It could be billed as the movie with a thousand climaxes."
      • Praised Lee and the fight choreography: Lee was "the Fred Astaire of martial arts, and many of the fights that could be merely brutal come across as lightning-fast choreography."
    • Howard Thompson, The New York Times: "The picture is expertly made and well-meshed; it moves like lightning and brims with color. It is also the most savagely murderous and numbing hand-hacker (not a gun in it) you will ever see anywhere."[71]
      • Noted the improved production values compared to other similar films
      • Commented on the similarities between the film and Dr. No (1962)
      • Enjoyed the "crisp" dialogue that Allin wrote, and the lean direction of Clouse
      • Thought that the cast's acting was quite good; praised Lee's performance as "downright fascinating"
    • Barbara L. Wilson, The Philadelphia Inquirer: "The saying goes that when you seen one kung fu film, you've seen them all, but for the first-timer the experience is a gas. It's like going back to a movie made in the 30s—the actors (?) [sic] jumping and leaping at each other, conveying expressions by rolling their eyeballs—the only contemporary touch being the use of Technicolor, and it is garish color."[72]
      • Commented on the audio - "The sound track, an amplified din of the grunts, groans and bodily contact made by the combatants in action, can only be likened to the audio of a pro football game."
      • Gave mild praise to the story - "Although the kung fu films aren't popular because of their story lines, screenwriter Michael Allin does try to hold Enter the Dragon together with a thread of plot."
      • Commented on a costume choice: "The one innovative thing about Enter the Dragon is having the good guys clothed in black when they are released from prison to help Lee and Saxon stomp the baddies into submission."
    • Jerry Oster, Daily News, 1-and-a-1/2 stars: "Enter the Dragon, the latest kung fu migraine—and money-maker—is slick junk."[73]
      • Said the film "has the exuberant photographic style of television shows like Mission: Impossible and its fighting scenes might have been choreographed by Busby Berkeley"
      • Complimented Lee's fight choreography - "Lee died a few weeks ago and it is not just out of respect for his memory that I say he had an undeniable flair for dramatizing his specialty."
      • Liked the final fight scene
    • Patrick McGilligan, The Boston Globe: "If you take the entire affair nonchalantly—passing over the measly soundtrack, ignoring the stubby direction—you will easily smile, laugh, enjoy your way through Enter the Dragon, squirming a bit at the more gruesome murders and wincing at those sound-effects chops and thuds."[74]
      • Described the movie as a "silly little film", said Warner Brothers "should know better", and said Saxon and Kelly "execute some fairly flamboyant kung fu moves, perhaps to compensate for their obtuse acting"
      • Criticized the "ridiculously familiar" plot and maintained the dialogue was "circa very early late show", but asked readers to consider the hypothetical situation where Lee worked with an equally talented director and "skipped hackneyed stories"
      • Liked Lee's acting - "He is a restrained and, at times, very funny actor, and foremost, he is an amazing fighter, a classical combatant with astonishing poise."
    • Colin Bennett, The Age: "Cashing in on the current film craze for Hong Kong bone-crunchers, the Bros. Warner and director Robert Clouse, aided by Lee as fight director and an ear-splitting track of cracking and smashing, have produced an expert, spectacular copy."[75]
      • Liked the cinematography - "The balletic nature of these murderous acrobatics is accentuated by some revealing slow motion [...]"
      • Believed the final fight scene was "ingeniously shot"
    • Kevin Thomas, Los Angeles Times: "Enter the Dragon [...] is quite a few cuts—perhaps chops is the better word—above the usual kung fu epic."[76]
      • Notes that martial arts films were usually rather poor, and acknowledges that the film is only "competently made"
      • Praised Clouse's "knowing direction"; Thomas believed that even though "the material is strictly comic book trash", Clouse treats the film as though he was making a cartoon, and is able to give it a "modicum of style"
      • Critical of Lee - says that "no actor, the handsome, muscular Lee projects an unappealingly smug personality"
      • Believed that due to Lee's unlikeability, Saxon had to "carry the picture as capably as circumstances permit"
      • Praised Kelly, said he made "a pleasing film debut"
    • Perry Stewart, Fort Worth Star-Telegram: "As martial arts films go, Enter leads the pack so far."[77]
      • Chafed at the fact that he did not want to call it a "martial arts film", as he did not want to associate the word "art" with "these chop-chop melodramas"
      • Praised the audio, noted that the Warner Brothers budget elevated the film's overall look and sound compared to other kung fu films
      • Mild praise for Allin, called the script "downright literate" in comparison to others
      • Acknowledged the "good supporting cast" of Hong Kong and American actors
      • Liked Kelly's performance, called the actor "a major find"
      • Commented that the film shouldn't have received an R rating, but noted that it likely received it due to the "couple of instances" of gore onscreen; opined that it should be up to the producers to either edit it out or live with the rating
      • Praised Shih, said he was a "standout with his Dr. No demeanor"
      • LIked Yeung's performance, said "Yang Sze has an active career ahead of him if the martial arts fad holds out"\
    • Greg Mims, Pittsburgh Courier: "Had this been a James Bond film, the agent would have carried out his mission via a myriad of sophisticated weaponry and curt sexual references. The hands and feet of the late Bruce Lee, however, prove more deadly than Bond's entire jet-age steel arsenal."[78]
      • Noted that Enter the Dragon was derivative of other adventure films
      • Realized that the film benefited from the high production values of Warner Brothers, ensuring exotic locations and costumes
      • Praised Lee's acting - Lee is "consistently full of acting surprises" and that he "fully conveys the intense concentration and mental temperament necessary to carry out the difficult maneuvers"
      • Mild praise of Kelly - "[Kelly's] talents as an actor, though still marginal, have improved significantly since his Melinda role"
      • Appreciated that the action was rooted in reality - "What there is, is the sheer physical artistry and grace this is required by athletics of this nature; in fact, much of it is akin to ballet."
    • George Anderson, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: "Enter the Dragon is part kung fu and part Fu Manchu, and i say kung phooey."[79]
      • Accepted that Enter the Dragon was the best of the kung fu films they have seen, but hoped that the martial arts film craze would "be as profitable and as short-lived" as people's enthusiasm for the Batman TV show
      • Was intrigued by Lee - "His fanatic facial expressions and animal-like yells combined with his tightly muscled body, looking like an anatomical sketch of the human muscle system, made his an altogether distinctive presence before the camera."
      • Commented on the efforts by the producers to appeal to the broadest possible audience through the racial diversity of its cast: "Couldn't they have worked in a part for Sacheen Littlefeather?"
    • Hal Crowther, The Buffalo News: "It's not hokey. In this ballet of pain and mutilation, Lee is a matchless Nureyev. The others are just athletes—he made karate a film art."[80]
      • Noted the film's action was much faster-paced relative to Western films by John Wayne
      • However, he said the film was "terrible": the villains are "from comic books", the plot is "spongy filler", and remarked that Capri had "that vacant producer's girlfriend look"
      • Noted the racial diversity of the cast that he said was rooted "in the best tradition of exploitation films" - remarked that the scene with the racist cops "panders embarrassingly to black audiences"
      • Critical of Saxon - "Just to make sure you know where you are, quality-wise, the filmmakers toss in expressionless John Saxon, that unmarked veteran of two dozen bad films of his own."
      • Generally appreciated Lee - said that while he was "an Oriental Clint Eastwood, with one perfect give-a-damn expression", and that his acting was "stiffer than Frankenstein", Crowther said that in fight scenes he turns into a "superhero"

Awards and accolades[edit]

Post-release[edit]

Home media[edit]

  • Warner Home Media released the film on both DVD and VHS in 1998 for its 25th anniversary[81][82][83]
    • The 25th anniversary DVD includes interview footage with Linda Lee Cadwell, personal footage of Lee, audio commentary with Heller and Allin, and various theatrical trailers and TV spots[82]
    • Both the DVD and VHS have 20 minutes of additional footage from the Lee family archives, as well as a seven-minute behind the scenes video called Location: Hong Kong with Enter the Dragon[82]
  • It was released as a special edition DVD in 2004[84]

Other media[edit]

Themes[edit]

Theme notes[edit]

Michael Sragow, The A List: The National Society of Film Critics' 100 Essential Films

Leon Hunt, "Han's Island Revisited: Enter the Dragon as Transnational Cult Film", Unruly Pleasures: The Cult Film and its Critics

  • Hunt proposes that Enter the Dragon was "the first transnational Chinese-American action film"[57]: 75 
  • Hong Kong and the film share "a similar sense of hybridity, of uncertain ownership and cultural affiliation"[57]: 75 
  • Hunt asserts that the film's popularity is primarily a "Western and Japanese phenomenon", as the film did not perform as well at the Hong Kong box office as Fist of Fury and The Way of the Dragon[57]: 75 

M. Ray Lott, The American Martial Arts Film

  • Han's island acts as a "male paradise" where men can train, fight and bond together[89]: 11–12 
  • The film uses plenty of animal symbolism:[89]: 12 
    • Su-lin is hunted like prey by Han's henchmen
    • This is a fate that is mirrored later when Lee is being pursued in the drug lab
    • Williams witnesses Lee's incredible agility and calls him a human fly
    • The preying mantis fight club on the boat: Lee bets on the smaller insect to win, and the smaller mantis foreshadows Lee's underdog triumph over Han by overturning and defeating its larger opponent
  • Women in the film are treated as "marginal beings" falling into either an asexual, chaste group (Su-lin, Mei-ling), or as submissive servants or prostitutes for the fighters[89]: 13 

Legacy[edit]

  • Magill's Survey of Cinema notes the film has "come to be regarded by critics and audiences alike as the definitive martial arts film"[45]: 715 
  • A 2021 article by The Irish Times notes that the image of Lee's body littered with claw mark scratches is "one of the most distinctive pieces of '70s iconography and arguably one of the most paradigmatic images in cinema."[90]
  • Many martial arts magazines, like the British Kung-Fu Monthly and the American Action Black Belt, were created in the wake of this popularity[91]

Cultural impact[edit]

Critical reassessment[edit]

  • Esquire named the film one of the 10 best American martial arts movies[114]
  • /Film ranked it second on a list of the 15 most influential martial arts films of all time[115]
  • Critics from The Guardian and The Observer picked the film first in their list of the top 10 martial arts movies[116]
  • Paste rated it third on their list of the 100 best martial arts movies of all time[117]
  • Empire ranked it number 474 on their list of The 500 Greatest Movies of All Time[118]

Sequels and spin-offs[edit]

Notes[edit]


References[edit]

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