Enter Three Dragons / The Dragon on Fire (1978) Review
Enter Three Dragons / The Dragon on Fire (1978) is possibly the prototype for what would become The Clones of Bruce Lee as there were at 2 1/2 of the better known impersonators in this semi confusing picture. I say 2 1/2 because one didn’t have much of a career, although he did get to portray one of the key clones in the actual Clones movie, but here was pretty lame. Nonetheless, some familiar faces pop up in this movie and this may have been the start of Godfrey Ho’s so-called Dragon Lee “pet project.” While not the first of the #bruceploitation films, it certainly would not be the last but possibly was the gateway drug to Dragon Lee’s entrance as a Bruce Lee knock off.
Enter Three Dragons (as I will call it here) is certainly a Bruceploitation movie that isn’t as tongue-firmly-planted-in-cheek compared to the more infamous The Clones of Bruce Lee. As I mentioned, this movie utilizes three Bruce Lee impersonator types as a kind of hook and even a not-so-subtle plot device that causes confusion both for the audience and some of the characters in the movie. But I think that part somewhat helps make this movie more interesting than it deserves.
The movie starts out in a very dark setting presumably in some random back alley where Samuel Walls, creatively named Sammy here, an African American martial arts person, gets ambushed over some diamonds. Sammy seems like a shady character and that goes into playing how he works himself into this barely coherent plot. Effectively though, this ambush causes him to be blamed over the diamonds, which in these more modern films can be substituted for drugs, prostitution, money laundering or some other cheap underground, nefarious affair that require the police to investigate.
After this beat down, we actually get a neat little 60’s/70’s pr0n music introduction with the night life in either Hong Kong or Taiwan. I honestly really like these types of shots because they certainly have a nostalgic/atmospheric quality to them that give these movies a little bit of personality compared to the typically bland scenery of a studio set or some far off country side location that has no context except for permitting outrageous fights.
From there we encounter fake Bruce Lee #1 (for this movie) played by a guy named Francis Kwok Si-Chi, someone who played another fake Bruce Lee (or Bruce Lee 3) in The Clones of Bruce Lee (albeit not very well as he jobs out to a random laser blast; but I suppose he’s still better than Chuck or Bruce Thai, who gets almost nothing in that movie). He’s arriving at an airport in a Bruce Lee stylized red tank top, rice bowl haircut and dark sunglasses. Note for the entire duration of this honestly wretched movie, he’s dressed in this manner. Accompanying him is comedy figure To Siu-Ming. To Siu-Ming is a fairly recognizable figure in the kung fu drama as he has a twisted eye and usually plays a goofball. Here, he’s no different. which means you get a rather annoying person filling up time. But in a way his goofiness/stupidity is actually part of the plot as you’ll see shortly.
At the airport as well is yet the other main Bruce Lee impersonator here Jang Il-Do. Unlike the other impersonators, I would argue this guy had more of a normal filming or kung fu career than the bulk of the impersonators. For this film, they just had him grow his hair out a lot more, make mean Bruce faces and occasionally wear sunglasses as well as the signature white wife beater. We don’t know this character’s purpose as he leaves the airport but his appearance may seem confusing to the audience since we just witnessed the other Bruce lookalike exiting.
Rounding out these is an ill placed Nick Cheung, who arguably, is the real star of the movie (or at least half). He has a sister and the fake Bruce (Dragon) shows up at his home with the goof. He calls Dragon “cousin” and inquires about his kung fu but oddly doesn’t question the person’s identity. Likewise, this Dragon character doesn’t repudiate his own identity nor wonder whom these people are.
The other fake Bruce Lee/Dragon somehow manages to wonder on foot all the way from that major airport down to a loading dock by the sea. Why he goes there of all places is a total mystery except that we know it’s so he can get into a fight to demonstrate he knows kung fu. In turn, one of the men who gets his ass kicked survives to report his findings to the main boss of the movie, Philip Ko. Philip Ko is also one of the action/martial arts directors here but he’s at the very least an excellent villain and generally has good to very good fight scenes worth watching. So I do become more intrigued to see where this movie is leading.
Instead, we get another scene of Nick and Sammy randomly encountering each other. They have some nearly indecipherable dialog that, of course, leads to another fight (can you see a pattern in these kung fu movies?????) fake Dragon shows up to prevent them from fighting. Then at some bar/den, they discuss plans about a name that I do not recognize, probably the diamond smuggler character. Fake Dragon poses and pretends he’s Bruce but he gets slammed by Sammy (try saying that a few dozen times) saying his kung fu sucks effectively and finally they figure out this guy isn’t the real Dragon. Now, why on earth didn’t anyone determine this at the start besides that goofy side kick character?
Speaking of the goofy side kick character, he shows up again with the fake Dragon. They encounter a loan shark who threatens the goofball by telling him he’s going to strip him until he receives $700. The fake Dragon does a few shitty moves but they run off before everyone can figure out just how bad of a fake Bruce Lee this joker is. As the loan shark chases the pair, he encounters another guy who has similar attire to the fake Dragon running and assumes it’s the fake Dragon. Naturally, this turns out to be the real Dragon, who proceeds to kick his ass and send him literally running off in a Daffy Duck-like fashion.
The movie slows down to a snails pace once again because we’re forced to endure the dialog of Nick Cheung and his sister. Both realize just how idiotic they are and talk about dreaming as well as the confusion surrounding Sammy and the fake Dragon. It’s established that Sammy and Nick Cheung are friends in this movie, despite nearly trying to kill each other earlier but that Sammy had asked the real Dragon to aid him. Then it’s revealed that Dragon has a half brother, played by none other than the pet project himself, Dragon Lee.
Dragon Lee gets a pro-wrestling kind of entrance where the Midnight Express theme plays as he’s practicing kung fu in some mountainous region. After seeing Enter the Clones of Bruce Lee and listening to Dragon Lee’s explanation for things, I suspect that Dragon Lee only was used sporadically in this movie because it probably was his first movie outside of Korea and that he most likely had limited Chinese skills. His hkmdb profile indicates that this might’ve been his second movie ever made and that he manages to get top billing, despite barely appearing in this movie at all. Methinks that Godfrey Ho probably was assigned to film Dragon Lee’s parts, which maybe how they formed some sort of working relationship. But again this is all my hypothesis.
At any rate, after the segue, we get back to the main plot where Nick Cheung and Dragon meet finally. The air is cleared up on the two Dragons’ names. The “real” Dragon asks where the other guy is and Nick replies, “Somewhere.” Like WTF man? You just dropped this poor fucker who probably has no idea where he is, why he’s around or what he’s doing? It just makes me think everyone in the movie is of unexceptional low intelligence. At any rate, this gives Nick and Dragon a chance to, you guessed it, have a practice fight. On top of that, Dragon is dressed in Bruce Lee’s famous yellow striped jogging suit to further prove that the film makers were shameless in their Bruceploitation motives.
Dragon, Sammy and Nick have a heart-to-heart and try to figure out how to get Sammy out of this mess. On the other hand, fake Dragon goes for a walk on a night in town. He stumbles across a topless bar that doesn’t show any topless women. Also, he’s still dressed up as a shitty imitator Bruce. He looks for some woman called Kathy (why the non-Chinese names?) and approaches a woman in the lounge area threateningly. Alexander, who also appears in The Clones of Bruce Lee, is probably some pimp/bouncer and takes interest in this fake but he gets punted (very poorly) to the ground by this lame impersonator.
To increase the RNGesus of appearances in this movie, we arrive at some gym where Dragon Lee is practicing. Alexander and another guy, who looks like a poor man’s Luke Skywalker, manifest and challenge Dragon Lee, which is absolutely the most futile thing to do. So you can conjecture the finality of these two jokers. Not oddly, these two would return in The Clones of Bruce Lee so I suspect that many of these people just figured on working together again later on to maximize their Bruceploitation prowess.
Then in even more nonsensical non sequitur, Philip Ko decides to find a few of these people. At some river bed, he encounters Nick Cheung and has a fight where Nick admits, “You’re really good.” Guess, Philip Ko had to get that in as the action director. For whatever reason, Nick is allowed to live so that Philip Ko can go on to fight Dragon, who also survives the encounter. Philip Ko continues to brag with his assistant glazing him.
Next, Dragon Lee shows up at some massive mansion kind of spot where that goof apparently lives. Just as Dragon Lee appears, the idiotic loan shark and an assistant show up to try and collect from the goof. Of course, this gives Dragon Lee the opportunity for a comedic Bruce Lee style ass kicking. Also, this presents a chance for Dragon Lee to meet Nick and clarify his relationship as well as the identity of the two Dragons.
Business picks up as Philip Ko decides to capture the sister and the fake Dragon. The fake Dragon gets lamely clubbed over the head by the loan shark and is tied up at Philip Ko’s estate. They shove an orange in his mouth for good measure. Also, Sammy contacts Chiang Tao, who apparently is a boss of an operation that Sammy got involved with in terms of the diamonds. One of Philip Ko’s assistants spies on Chiang Tao’s phone conversation and plots to kill Chiang Tao secretly.
Another comedic scene occurs with the loan shark finally catching the goofball and stripping him naked. The goofball goes back to the household wearing a large cardboard box. Nick and Dragon are there and the goofball learns that he’s simply an idiot because of not recognizing the difference in names nor faces. So if you were still confused about the two Dragons, this is the moment where it’s demonstrated how you’re an equal moron to the goofball for this ridiculous plot.
Sammy gets ambushed by Philip Ko’s men. He’s accompanied by some guy named “Georgie,” whom I doubt we had met in this movie until this point. But he’s been used by the sub boss to lure Sammy into this trap so that we get another prolonged fight. Also, apparently that loan shark is part of this criminal operation (maybe to make it convenient?) Dragon and Nick show up to help Sammy but I think the rando friends jobs out after he gets to make his cameo to receive a payday.
While the good guys get distracted, the sister gets kidnapped at night. The guys return and figure out what happened. Sammy blames himself and decides to try and meet Chiang Tao in the mountain where he “practices kung fu once a month.” Sammy tells Chiang Tao the real deal about the diamonds and I guess for once Chiang Tao isn’t the main villain or even a sub villain in a movie.
For whatever reason, Nick and Dragon Lee show up at a Buddhist temple. They speak with some monk who talks about fighting, why to fight and violence. If there was a moral here, it’s kinda wasted just because the movie has nothing but nonstop fights, corrupt people and a desire for serious ass kicking. So this injection made no sense outside of bad pacing. Eventually, Chiang Tao meets the other sub bosses and a variety of heel-face-heel turns occur all at once, leading to a Game of Thrones type of “Valar Morghulis” scenario that almost everyone gets killed, including a sub-sub-sub boss by Philip Ko, now that he’s secured the diamonds (because why leave jabronies around when you can have it all?)
The three main heroes start to plot on a rescue operation. Sammy actually comes up with the plan since he’s been in cahoots with the evildoers. There’s a gratuitous 7-up and Coke in movie ad (btw a LOT of 7-up drinking here) before in movie ads really started to becoming annoying and prevalent. While his friends sleep, Sammy decides to go on his own to infiltrate the big boss’ spot at night. In turn, he encounters Bolo Yeung and barely survives the encounter. His friends wake up and immediately see that Sammy has gone off.
To continue this off putting pacing, we go back to the Buddhist temple where Dragon Lee prays and undergoes more philosophical dribble with the monk. The loan shark makes one more attempt at the goof and Dragon Lee saves his ass and reveals where the others have gone off to. Sammy is shown badly injured as Dragon and Nick discover him. But pretty much that’s the last of Sammy we’ll see for the movie and we have no idea what his fate would be.
The other two invade Philip Ko’s home and split up. Dragon fights with Bolo to avenge Sammy while Nick fights an underboss and rescues his sister and the fake Dragon. Nick tells fake Dragon to take his sister back so that Nick can fight el big boss. But that pretty much ends the sister and fake Dragon’s story.
An exceptionally long and drawn out fight occur where Dragon and Nick take on Philip Ko. While I do enjoy Philip Ko, neither Nick nor Dragon are skilled nor interesting enough to make me think they’ll win this fight because we still have Dragon Lee who is slowly coming up. Philip Ko gives Nick a nasty throat injury so that Dragon has to chase after Philip Ko for a 1v1 scenario.
However, in another cameo, Lee Hoi-Sang manifest for the first time in the movie to fight Dragon Lee. As you may recall, Lee Hoi-Sang plays that Iron Head guy in Mad Mad Kung Fu. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have a hard head in this movie and has the unfortunate fate of meeting Dragon Lee, whose sole purpose is to kick everyone’s asses and no sell virtually everything to look super badass. Of course, Lee Hoi-Sang is no match for Dragon Lee’s wannabe Bruce Lee impersonation act so he jobs in an embarrassing manner. Nick shows up to tell Dragon Lee where his brother is.
In an actual instance of not in the nick of time (pun partly intended), Dragon Lee shows up to witness his brother getting slaughtered by Philip Ko. I guess Dragon wasn’t Bruce Lee enough to avoid jobbing here. Dragon Lee is super pissed and goes into full Bruce Lee impersonator mode, which means Philip Ko stands zero chance of doing much except get a gratuitous ass whoopin’. Dragon Lee’s dub gets a great moment where he screams, “You killed my BRUDDAAAAAHHHHH!”
Poor Philip Ko has already had his ass beaten by two other guys so his defenses are down, which allows Dragon Lee to smash him apart. Philip Ko does manage to get a few decent blows in, including a major scratch on Dragon Lee. But that only serves to increase Dragon Lee’s pissed off state. Dragon Lee asks, “What other styles can you do?” for which Philip Ko replies, “I can do the Devil’s Palm.” We get a great line from Dragon Lee where he says, “This time the devil will get exercised” (maybe referring back to the Buddhist temple portions?). Dragon Lee flexes and does a series of backflip kicks and flies up to land on Philip Ko’s neck and twists his legs so that Philip Ko can do his signature blood puke spot to end the movie.
But what a mess of a movie. I think they tried to make this plot extra complex by dumping the various clones in place. Dragon Lee is billed as the top star in this movie but he mostly seems like a background character until the end. Most of the plot is moved forward by Nick Cheung and Sammy. While Sammy is a novel character (because he’s a black guy in a kung fu movie), Nick Cheung simply does nothing for me. He’s kinda there, sucking up my interest with his black hole of a personality. Likewise the other Dragon can only do a mean Bruce Lee face. While he might be a legitimate martial artist, he simply lacks any screen magnetism especially once Dragon Lee shows up.
Part of the other problem in this movie is that the pace is very uneven where you have sudden fight scenes for no good reason other than to have them interjected almost randomly. Then once we’re back to the core plot of the diamonds, Sammy and Nick, the movie drags like molasses. None of the characters are intelligent except perhaps Philip Ko as he’s the only one scheming and manages to secure the diamonds (which never gets resolved in terms of their fate after all this hassle). The plot might seem straight forward but I think the various turns and reveals just muddy the pacing and potentially confuse the audience. Also, the relationship between the Dragons is equally troublesome because of how easily the characters can’t themselves can’t figure out whom the right person to deal with is.
Besides, the 70s type of scenery and occasional pr0n music, the only real reason to catch this movie is to watch Dragon Lee and possibly Philip Ko. I’m certain that the agenda of this movie was to get Dragon Lee over to a Chinese and/or international audience. At the same time, I don’t think he may have had good language skills so his interactions were limited just like his dialog. Unfortunately, that put more pressure on giving additional screen time to Nick Cheung, whom I simply don’t care for as someone who should be anywhere near a leading role. Also, the encounter (aka main event) between Philip Ko and Dragon Lee felt really anti-climatic since Philip Ko spent too much time dealing with Nick and the other Dragon. Once Dragon Lee and Philip Ko locked up, Philip Ko was already beaten up and barely could do much against Dragon Lee. That probably was by design but it left me feeling that Dragon Lee wasn’t necessarily the superior martial artist to Philip Ko because he “cheated”.
Then there’s the various comedy elements in this movie. To Siu-Ming possibly is one of the most annoying actors I’ve seen in Chinese cinema. He’s always playing a comic relief character, making goofy faces because he has that bad eye. But it’s generally the same goofball character in every single movie. I tend to prefer him in a villain role though since his personality seems better suited getting his ass whooped by the good guys. In this movie, he’s just a guy who never pays his debts and gets bullied. Yet his friends never question why he’s got a loan shark on his ass the entire time. They don’t help him pay and defend him.
Finally, there’s the other fake Dragon/Bruce Lee impersonator. I have a special fixation for this guy in this movie because he basically sucks ass the entire time. There was another major old school kung fu movie site that reviewed all these actors. One of the comments was how this guy ended up tied up the entire time in The Clones of Bruce Lee. Actually, the writer made a mistake (the guy in that movie was Chuck/Bruce Thai) and meant this movie. This impersonator would eventually show up in The Clones of Bruce Lee as a clone but he wasn’t tied up for over half the movie like he was here. One of the funny things about this movie was the title Enter Three Dragons, which implies these three characters who are named “Dragon” in this movie. But this guy hardly functions or does anything useful except get himself into more trouble. Probably, his best usage was getting the orange stuffed in his mouth.
One thing I will mention about the Tubi TV listing itself is that a lot of the details for this movie seem incorrect. The description itself I believe is from The Dragon, the Hero. Then for the cast, they list Dragon Lee twice as well as using his Korean name Keo Ryong. My only thought here is that whoever did the copyright must’ve gotten confused by this movie as well. But that’s to be expected when dealing with the Bruceploitation genre.