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Seven years ago, Brandon, the only son of the martial arts pioneer Bruce lee, was just starting out in acting. He first appeared with David Carradine in a TV movie called Kung Fu: The next generation. Back then, denying that he ever wanted to be “the next Bruce Lee” he said, ”I’m developing my own style. I’m not a clone of my father; I can do a lot more than martial arts. I know this: words are hallow. I will say that once. Then I will show you”. Brash words from a 27- year- old. Yet Brandon, while remaining forthright and assertive, seems to have delivered on his promise. He went to his father’s old stomping ground, Hong Kong, to make Legacy of Rage and returned to Hollywood to star with Dolph Lundgren in Showdown in little Tokyo in 1991. And Finally, in Rapid fire, which avoids martial arts clichés like the “one-man-against-a-hundred” fight and masks old standby stunts like the somersault over an aggressor’s head in enough realism to avoid looking cheesy, Lee has moved to the top of the bill. Watch out Van Damme. “My first concern was to make the story and characters plausible” the uncompromising young Brandon says. Hr sits in a Los Angeles hotel room with an athlete’s stillness, rationing his words “If audiences don’t care about people, the movie becomes a pointless exercise in who can fire the biggest explosions or break the most glass”. In the film, Brandon pits himself against the mafia, an oriental drug gang and a turncoat FBI man. Also on his side are a cop played by Powers Boothe and the memory of his father, who died under the tank in Tiananmen Square. He says “When the character sees his father’s dream do down in flames, he drops out and develops a chip on his shoulder. Then he meets powers boothe, who for all his gruffness has enlisted on the side of right, and he allows himself to be drawn into the same fight”. The situation in the film echoes Brandon’s own, thought he cautions “ Yes, I lost my father when I was young and yes, there were unresolved issues between us, but anyone who has lost a parent could identify with this character”. Bruce lee died in 1973 at the height of his fame. Brandon was eight and living in Hong Kong. He and his younger sister Shannon (now an opera singer) were raised in Los Angeles by their mother, who’s an American of Swedish ancestry. “My father trained me up until the time he passed away “. Brandon says of his martial arts beginnings “ I continued training with Danny Inosanto, Who was my father’s senior student. I owe my whole style to my father. Whatever I do in martial arts that seem to have value is attributable to my father. Anything else is probably a bad habit of my own. “I can’t say my father and I ever talked much about the art of acting. He was interested in the martial arts first and acting second. Acting was obviously a major pursuit of my own now, though I have a lot of respect for my father’s acting too.” Brandon studied acting at Emerson College in Boston and continues acting classes today. He has performed plays in New York and Los Angeles. He’s also a member of a Los Angeles theatre troupe called legal aliens and hopes to continue to work on stage, “subsidised by my films, as John Malkovich and Tim Robbins have done”. Just as Brandon is reaching his physical prime, martial arts movies have re-entered the mainstream “After the time of my father and later Chuck Norris, martial arts fell into the B-movie Category. But in the past few years, with the rise of Steven Seagull and Jean – Claude Van Damme, martial arts films have become staple again”. So far, Brandon has successfully walked the fine line between capitalising on his lucky parentage and striking out wholly on his own. After college, he initially intended to work his way up through the ranks of Hollywood. He was working as a production assistant in producer Al Ruddy’s company, hoping he’d get a two-line part in Cannonball run 3, if it ever got made, so he could join the Actor’s screen Guild. Instead, he was cast in Kung Fu: The movie, and had to face the inevitable comparisons with his legendary father. “If anybody expects me to live up to some image of my father”, He says firmly, “I can’t do it – he wouldn’t have wanted me to try and be the next Bruce Lee. And the one thing I’ll never do is The Revenge of Bruce Lee’s son. After college, he initially intended to work his way up through the ranks of Hollywood. He was working as a production assistant in producer Al Ruddy’s company, hoping he’d get a two-line part in Cannonball run 3, if it ever got made, so he could join the Actor’s screen Guild. Instead, he was cast in Kung Fu: The movie, and had to face the inevitable comparisons with his legendary father. “If anybody expects me to live up to some image of my father”, He says firmly, “I can’t do it – he wouldn’t have wanted me to try and be the next Bruce Lee. And the one thing I’ll never do is The Revenge of Bruce Lee’s son. The penultimate fight in the film was Brandon’s favourite. The Adversary is the chief villain’s chief bodyguard (played by martial arts master Al Leong). Brandon says: “ My view on fights is to cover the action as much as possible without cutting away. Don’t use editing as a band-aid for scenes where, if you saw the action continue, you’d see the performers off balance”. The Leong-Lee fight starts with Brandon’s character realising that he’s met his match. For half the fight he’s stumped and keeps trying to “bridge the gap” and land some kind of blow, but the fight reaches a climax of unedited toe-to-toe battling. Brandon describes working on the scene, getting up to demonstrate: “ You start at one-quarter speed, become used to each other’s moves and reactions. You step it up to half speed, starting in sync. Then you finally get going. Sometimes there’s a mistake and somebody gets tagged…” He suddenly stops talking, stares at me, and smiles. “That’s why we get those little pay checks we appreciate so much”.
our years of w |