Birth of the Dragon
Short description
Birth of the Dragon is an action drama built around a famous private fight in 1964 San Francisco. A young Bruce Lee, still known mainly as a martial arts instructor, teaches kung fu to students outside the Chinese community, which angers traditionalists in Chinatown. They bring in Wong Jack Man, a respected master, to challenge him. The two meet in a secret, largely unregulated contest whose outcome has been disputed ever since. Alongside the rivalry, the film follows Steve McKee, a young man drawn into Lee's circle who becomes a witness to the events leading up to the fight. The story covers Lee's early years in America rather than his later film career.
The film was directed by George Nolfi, his second feature after The Adjustment Bureau and the second of four films he has directed, including The Banker and Elevation. The screenplay is by Christopher Wilkinson and Stephen J. Rivele, who also produced with Michael London. Philip Ng plays Bruce Lee, Xia Yu plays Wong Jack Man, and Billy Magnussen plays Steve McKee, with Ron Yuan, Darren E. Scott and King Lau in supporting roles. It was made by Blumhouse Productions, Good Universe, BH Tilt and WWE Studios.
On IMDb the film holds a rating of 4.3 out of 10 from 53 reviews, while on TMDB it has a rating of 5.8 out of 10 from 340 votes. That gap suggests viewers were more tolerant of it than critics. Made for a budget of 31 million dollars, it took in about 7 million dollars worldwide, a result that fell well short of its cost.
What's left behind the scenes
- The character of Steve McKie is based on actor Steve McQueen, who trained with Bruce Lee in the late 1960s.
- The film's storyline regarding Von contains numerous factual errors. He was not a Shaolin monk, nor did he come to San Francisco as punishment for nearly killing someone in a fight. He subsequently did not return to China, but remained in San Francisco, where he taught martial arts until his retirement in 2005.
- In the film, Bruce Lee's school is located in San Francisco, although in reality, at that time it was in Oakland, California.
- The film shows Bruce Lee filming a martial arts movie with himself in the leading role, which was not the case in reality. By this period in his life, Lee had already starred in 20 films in Hong Kong before moving to the USA. He had abandoned his acting career to focus on martial arts.
- According to the film, Von arrives in San Francisco aboard the ship Jeremiah O'Brien, where he meets Steve. It is a Liberty ship, built in the USA during World War II and subsequently refurbished. Jeremiah O'Brien is one of the few remaining ships of this type in the world. It is docked in San Francisco and serves as a kind of museum. During World War II, it repeatedly transported cargo across the Atlantic and participated in the Normandy landings on June 6, 1944.
- The initial version of the film was so poorly received by audiences that it was urgently re-edited, removing many scenes with Billy Magnussen as Steve and focusing more on Philip Ng as Bruce Lee.
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