Manfred Wong, and Wai Man Yip. The main actor is Aarif Rahman (Wang Lee Hom look alike!! *sigh*).
Okay, a little background on Bruce Lee for anyone out there who is curious:
Born Lee Jun Fan, on November 27, 1940, in San Francisco, California. His father, a Hong Kong opera singer, moved with his wife and three children to the United States in 1939; his fourth child, a son, was born while he was on tour in San Francisco. Bruce studied dance, once winning a cha-cha competition. As a teenager, he became a member of a Hong Kong street gang, and in 1953 began studying kung-fu to sharpen his fighting skills. In 1959, after Lee got into trouble with the police for fighting, his mother sent him back to the U.S. to live with family friends outside Seattle, Washington.
He got a job teaching the Wing Chun style of martial arts that he had learned in Hong Kong to his fellow students and others. Through his teaching, Lee met Linda Emery, whom he married in 1964. By that time, Lee had opened his own martial arts school in Seattle.
Lee gained a measure of celebrity with his role in the television series The Green Hornet, which aired from 1966 to 1967, while his most notable role came in the 1969 film Marlowe, starring James Garner. Confronted with the dearth of meaty roles and the prevalence of stereotypes regarding actors of Asian heritage, Lee left Los Angeles for Hong Kong in 1971, with his wife and two children (Brandon, born in 1965, and Shannon, born in 1967).
End of history lesson. Onto the film!
Bruce Lee, My Brother is an 'eh' sort of film. The positive side to this film is the quirky, cute humour that Rahman depicts very well and the bittersweet inspiration near the end of the film. This movie is less action (like I expected) and more to do with Lee's family and younger life in Hong Kong, so the point of view from which Wong and Yip directed it is relatively original. As BeyondHollywood.com says, "What 'Bruce Lee, My Brother' lacks in the action department, it somewhat makes up for it in other areas...“My Brother” is more palatable as an easy-going coming-of-age drama, at least when it’s not masquerading as the true story of a famous person. The film boasts some impressive production values, and there is a very real sense of adoration for the film’s ’60s setting by the filmmakers." However, Bruce Lee is a martial arts actor, yet the film doesn't have a decent martial arts/ karate choreography? What is this? Also, the film is shot in choppy time intervals -- you haven't gotten a gist of the scene yet, and bam, it is ten years later, little Bruce is already 20 years old. It is interesting how quite a few Asian historical films (Great Revival, anyone?) has this weird problem. At many times in My Brother, I got lost with where the film was roughly going. That was a bit annoying. JapanCinema.com says, "The casting is great, and although the pace and the story telling is uneven in many parts, it tends to inhibit a pretty big, strong wave of positive momentum. Sadly, the fight scenes weren’t up to par. The main reason for my beef with the fighting is it is all visually appealing, yet, it never really shows the techniques of the famous wing chun system. I felt this is important to elaborate upon when dealing with a Bruce Lee biopic. Yes, this is the same wing chun at Ip Man’s school, and it’s during this section of the film where events portrayed can seem too dramatic to have been true. That aside, no effort was spared in the attention to detail in sets and costumes. Bruce Lee, My Brother is a movie with great packaging but contains nothing of real, lasting substance on the inside." I guess it is up to the viewer, and what you want to get out of the film...if it is good action, then maybe switch to Ip Man and Ip Man II.
IMDB rates this movie 6.6/10 stars -- I am with IMDB this time with 3.5/5 stars, aka 'average'. Nevertheless, worth a watch. Pretty inspiring.
This weekend, let's review a Taiwanese black comedy!
