CHUCK'S ROUNDHOUSE: The Way of the Dragon (1972)

The cultural legacy left behind by Carlos Ray Norris, far better known as Chuck Norris, is a varied one. Within the world of professional competitive martial arts, he was a respected elder statesman. Experts in such matters seems to be regard him as actually a good fighter. For those within cult movie circles, he was the second of Cannon Films' go-to action stars, the bridge between the classic Americana school of stoic masculinity represented by Charles Bronson to the waxed and glowing karate camp of Jean-Claude Van Damme. For people who grew up watching too much television in the nineties, he might be a source of fleeting nostalgia as the star of an inexplicably long-running, cheesy cop show and endless Total Gym infomercials. 

Those a little younger than that probably best know him as an internet meme. Chuck Norris' later fame became inseparable from the farcical “Chuck Norris facts.” These exaggerated claims of bad-assery expanded so far outside of their target audience of irony-poisoned message board dwellers that most people don't seem to know that the joke was originally that everyone thought Chuck Norris was a ridiculous figure. He was so worthy of mockery and scorn that suggesting he could do anything as cool as what he did in his movies was a source of laughter. How soon we forget the Walker, Texas Ranger lever. The late Mr. Norris would mostly use that resurgence to express support for his shitty political and religious beliefs, cutting multiple ads endorsing Mike Huckabee for president. Which did very little to dissuade the notion that we should only be laughing at this clown, not celebrating him. 

But to me, he was always Dad. I mean, not really. However, my mom's taste in guys tended towards burly mountain man types, meaning Chuck Norris was her most prominent movie star crush for many years. I attribute this to her having access to HBO in the mid-eighties when she was single and lonely. While not usually a fan of cheesy shoot-em-up flicks, she had a fondness for his films because of his hairy-chested macho appeal and a slight willingness to make fun of himself from time to time. This led to many light-hearted jokes about how Chuck was my “real father” and how, surely, any day now would be returning to claim me. Alas, I don't think that's gonna happen now, ma! What this really meant is I grew up with the roundhouse kicking star being an unusually common presence in my childhood. All of which is to say that I have a fondness for the work of Mr. Norris that extends beyond just being a fan of eighties action schlock and watching people get kicked, sometimes through windows. 

I haven't done one of these action star retrospectives in, uhh, about nine years but I always had a really good time with them. Chuck has been on my list of careers to do a proper retrospective of since the beginning. Once you start watching through every movie one of the “Expendables” guys has made, you kind of have to watch all of them. Obviously, with his recent passing, now would be the best time to pay tribute to whatever merits Mr. Norris had as a performer, a screen presence, and a kicker of men. Like I have done in the past, I am ripping off my buddies at All Outta Bubble Gum. When writing about Norris' movies, they would sometimes include a list of trademarks Chuck often does in his movie. I'll be doing this too, so I'll be watching out for these tropes as I work my way through four decades of this guy.

[THE CHUCK OF NORRIS]
[] Facial Hair
[] Jumps or Kicks Through a Window or Wall
[] Performs Spin Kick or Spin Punch to Enemy’s Face
[] Shows Off His Hairy Chest
[] Sports Some Cowboy Getup

I don't know how much of “Walker, Texas Ranger” or “Chuck Norris: Karate Kommandos” I'll be watching for this. Depends on how bored I get, I guess. Anyway, let's put on your action jeans and get kickin'. 

 

 

Of all the iconic faces and names in cinema, few have been as mythologized as Bruce Lee. In addition to being the most beloved and imitated martial artists of all time, he was a philosopher, a poet, a teacher, a roof top brawler against punk-ass Triad kids. Lee's screen presence and style was such that every movie he starred in essentially belonged to him. However, Bruce only officially directed two films and only completed one within his life time: Known in its native language as “Ferocious Dragon Crosses the River,” released in the U.S. after Lee's passing as “Return of the Dragon” and today best known as “The Way of the Dragon.” The film's overseas setting would show Lee's commitment to his belief that martial arts could have a place in any culture. To further that idea, he would cast an American karate champ he befriended as the movie's final boss, inadvertently launching another star's career along the way. 

Lee wrote the script for “Way of the Dragon” too and you can tell he didn't want to complicate matters too much for his directorial debut. It's a simple story. Tang Lung arrives in Rome, at the behest of Chen Ching-hua and her uncle Wang. Their Chinese restaurant has come under fire from local gangsters, who desperately want the land the building resides on for otherwise undisclosed reasons. The co-workers are skeptical of this “Chinese boxer's” prowess at first until he shows off his considerable skill by fighting off the mob enforcers. This infuriates the local boss, who sends more thugs, assassins, and bribes to get Tang out of the picture. When the martial artist continues to fight off their attempts, the gangster call in an American karate expert named Colt to escalate matters. The two men end up fighting to the death within the Coliseum, the entire reason, one suspects, the film was set in Rome in the first place. 

In addition to its standard “fighting to protect somebody's business from the mob” plot, “Way of the Dragon” is generally light-hearted in its approach. Lee introduces himself by gulping down four giant bowls of soup. This proceeds multiple moments where Tang Lung has to use the bathroom. The supporting characters are flatly ridiculous all around. There's a flamboyant, swishy Chinese middle man working for the baddies. Most of the other guys in the restaurant provide further comic relief. No attempt is made to flesh out the characters beyond their roles in the simple story. Chen not even getting enough distinction to classify as a damsel in distress. An attempt to add a little variety to the plot via a last minute betrayal doesn't quite land because the cast is so thinly sketched. 

As a visual storyteller, Lee does not exactly distinguish himself with “Way of the Dragon” either. The camera movement is sometimes shaky. The editing is occasionally choppy. Even when watching the meticulously restored Blu-Ray release, a few moments are a bit dimly lit. The non-fisticuffs scenes tend to drag a bit, the movie feeling rather slow at times. If not for the presence of, oh, the greatest martial arts star of all time, “Way of the Dragon” would probably be a pretty forgettable motion picture. Of course, Lee designs the film around his abilities as a fighter and star. That makes all the difference. His physicality, a wag of his finger, a sideways glance, is enough to intimidate his opponents. A sequence of Lee disrobing and stretching is enough to convey his superhuman fighting skill, to make him seem like a massive man on-screen. And once the punches start flying, “Way of the Dragon” becomes pretty damn impressive. To quote a man far wiser than myself, those cats really were fast as lightning. 

The sequences devoted to Lee kicking a sparring partner into a wall of boxes, fighting off a crowd with swirling nunchakus, or turning a simple mop handle into a powerful weapon hit with a quickness and power that would become the blue print for a thousand fight movies after this. That's where “Way of the Dragon” shines. I'm no Lee scholar but I know that fighting was more than just roughhousing for the star. You can see his philosophy expressing itself through these fight scenes. Strictly through body language, Lee expresses his Style of No Style, mixing different techniques and fast foot work to catch his enemy off-guard. The final bout with Chuck Norris is inter-cut with an innocent kitten watching, a placid contrast to the violent acts. Upon brutally dispatching his opponent, Bruce covers the corpse and prayers over it. There's a sense throughout that the film's heroes use violence largely as a defensive reaction to the more predatory forces against them.  

Why Uncle Wang's restaurant is so valuable isn't important. That the Chinese family are outsiders in this European land, however, is much more pointed. Lee faced discrimination both in Hong Kong and aboard for his mixed heritage. This theme informed “Fists of Fury” and reoccurs here as well, the foreigners persecuted by the locals simply for the crime of being outsiders. The contrast between the different schools of martial arts – especially Japanese karate against so-called “Chinese boxing” – is repeatedly referenced. When presented with the ruins of the ancient city, Wang Tung points out that it reminds him of the slums back home. Later, he's visibly unimpressed with Roman architecture. Lee's ego is almost as legendary as his fighting skills and it's difficult not to sniff that out here, in a story of Bruce single-handedly proving his mastery over everyone else around him. The final scene presents Tang as a mythic wanderer, going where ever he is needed to right wrongs. However, “The Way of the Dragon” also represents a cultural outsider standing up to the homogeneity of the land. No wonder these movies were so popular with urban black cultures in the seventies, despite the sole black character being a cartoonish bad guy.

I don't think I'm making any observations here that haven't been previously made a hundred times. One assumes that the relative small size of Lee's output, when compared to its massive influence, makes these the most studied and overturned of any kung-fu movies. “Way of the Dragon” is a sluggish, fairly goofy movie except for when the fists start to fly, at which point it becomes electrifying. Lee's titanic presence is unmistakable and his charisma could not be chained by shadowy direction or mediocre dubbing. As the world's introduction to Chuck Norris, “Way of the Dragon” is also pretty interesting. That final fight is legendary for good reason, the bodies in movement being almost poetic before the killing blows become brutal. While Chuck doesn't have much to do besides glower and kick – he doesn't show up until the movie is nearly over – the fact that he makes an impression in Lee's own movie is a feat on its own. [7/10]
 

[THE CHUCK OF NORRIS: 2 outta 5]
[] Facial Hair
[] Jumps or Kicks Through a Window or Wall
[X] Performs Spin Kick or Spin Punch to Enemy’s Face
[X] Shows Off His Hairy Chest
[] Sports Some Cowboy Getup