Dynamo (1978)

Dynamo (1978)
Chinese Title: 不擇手段
Translation: Unchosen Hand Segment

Starring: Ho Chung-Tao (Bruce Li), Ku Feng, Peter Chan, Lau Dan, Mary Hon, Chiang Tao, Yuen Yat-Chor, Yuen Shun-Yee, Lau Dan, Angel Reid, Chow Lai-Kuen
Director: Hua Shan
Action Director: Yuen Cheung-Yan

One of the fascinating things about Ho Chung-Tao’s career was how much of it was devoted to Bruce Lee himself. Bruce Li starred in quite a few biopics of the Man, including Bruce Lee: A Dragon Story; Story of the Dragon; Bruce Lee: The Man, the Myth; Young Bruce Lee; and He’s a Legend, He’s a Hero. At best, they are cheap kung fu films that suggest that the real Bruce was getting in fights every other day. At worst, they were just as sleazy as the infamous self-serving “biopic” Bruce Lee and I (1976), but with incompetent choreography to boot.

However, not content to just appear in Bruce Lee biopics, Bruce Li also starred in a number of films set in alternate universes following Bruce Lee's death. The most famous and most financially successful of these was Exit the Dragon, Enter the Tiger (1976). Bruce Lee, We Miss You (1975) is considered painfully mediocre. Then there’s New Game of Death (1975), in which a martial artist (Bruce Li) is invited to finish the footage for Game of Death in the first five minutes. The next 80 minutes are then the filmmakers’ version of what the finished footage looked like (hint: it has nothing to do with the real movie). Interestingly enough, both the aforementioned movies had Bruce Li playing both Bruce Lee and someone else.

Dynamo also falls into that category and promises a film about what's it is like to be a Bruce Lee imitator. Unfortunately, it does not follow through on the premise and by the second half, is just a bunch of random fight scenes. Bruce Li plays Lee Ting-Yee, a wing chun student and cab driver in Hong Kong. He is a promising martial artist who's about to get a big break in the wake of Bruce Lee's death. One day, Lee Ting-Yee gets into a fight with a bunch of carjackers, which fight is witnessed by a female marketing exec (Mary Hon, of Spirit of the Sword and The Legend of Speed) and her talent manager (Lau Dan, of Ten Tigers of Shaolin). Impressed with his skills and his supposed resemblance to Bruce Lee, they hand him a contract to be an actor and, from what I understand, ring fighter as well(!)

So Lee Ting-Yee quickly becomes a sensation in the Hong Kong movie industry. However, his kung fu still needs a bit of work, so Lee's manager hires an alcholic kung fu master (Ku Feng, Avenging Eagle and New One-Armed Swordsman) to further Ting-Yee's training. At first they really resent each other, since, like most kung fu masters, the training often comes across more as torture than anything else. However, Ting-Yee eventually learns to respect his new master.

While all this is going on, the Cultural Company, a rival marketing agency, is coming on hard times. Their clients are failing to renew their contracts, signing up with the company that represents Lee instead. Upset at their losses in the wake of Lee Ting-Yee's rise to fame, they decide to put an end to him, sending out hired killers to murder him during a publicity tour. Finally, the Cultural Company simply kidnaps Ting-Yee's dance instructor girlfriend (Chow Lai-Kuen, of Crack Shadow Boxers) and gives him an ultimatum: He has to lose in the ring fight that he'll fight in Chicago in a few weeks. If not, she'll die. Obviously, if he loses, his credibility as a martial artist—and thus his career as the next Bruce Lee—is over as well.

Yeah, like I said, the film really should've focused on the REAL dangers of being a martial arts star and the feelings of someone who was hired to imitate the best in the business. After all, Jimmy Ho Chung Tao was not really a fan of his Bruce Li image and has said so numerous times in interviews. To have a film about him struggling to create his own style instead of mimmicking that of another would've been more compelling. Unfortunately, the whole kidnapping and attempted murder subplots really turn a film about a chopsocky actor into just another chopsocky film.

There are a number of other subplots that really don't add a whole lot to the movie. The most notable is the affair that Lee Ting-Yee has with a French actress named Angie. Their "relationship" was originally put into papers by his producer for extra publicity, and puts Lee's relationship with his dance instructor girlfriend in jeopardy. However, nothing is really done with the whole bit and it seems to have been put in the script mainly as a way to put female nudity into the film (although the version I saw cut it out). There's also another subplot involving a conflict between Ku Feng's character and some thugs, including Peter Chan of Encounter of the Spooky Kind, but it doesn't add anything to the film.

With a tighter script, the film could have been an exposé of sorts about the shallowness and superficiality that comes with being a star. The movie suggests that most of the tabloid stories about Lee Ting-Yee’s life are manufactured by the marketing agency in order to keep his name in the limelight. It makes for an interesting contrast with Game of Death, in which the Bruce Lee character refuses to join the syndicate. This film hints at what it would have been like if Billy Lo had given in to their demands.

Thus, with a plot that doesn't know what it wants to accomplish, the mainly reason to see this film is to see the fight sequences, which were choreographed by Yuen Cheung-Yan (best known in the West for choreographing the 2000 adaptation of Charlie's Angels and Daredevil). Some of the earlier fights are played as complete fights from the films he makes. As the film progresses, the fights stem from the failed attempts on Lee’s life. The fights are a mixed bag. They certainly are numerous, but quality-wise they seem to fluctuate from sloppy early on to quite good as the film progresses.

Video Asia released this on DVD in 2008 as part of their Martial Arts Essentials Volume 4: The Films of Yuen Woo-Ping Series Two. That’s not quite accurate, as the movie was choreographed by Woo-Ping’s brother. However, the English-language version of this film has two fight scenes spliced in from the 1976 Shaw Brothers film Bruce Lee and I, which Yuen Woo-Ping did choreograph. However, that film starred Danny Lee as Bruce, not Bruce Li. As you might expect, it is jarring for a fight scene to pop up with an obviously different actor in the role. The first fight was a reenactment of the infamous Dojo Fight from Fist of Fury, and it’s not too bad. The second pilfered fight is treated as a dream sequence, and has Danny Lee (as Bruce) fighting some random thugs in the countryside, including Tino Wong Cheung. That particular fight is very complex and shapes oriented, which is out of place for both a modern movie and one that focuses on Bruce Lee, who was always against that sort of thing.

The highlight of the film comes when Lee goes to Japan and is challenged to a duel by a karate master played by Chiang Tao. Lee beats up everybody in the dojo and then has a great face-off with Chiang himself. The final fight  is between Bruce Li and a big Caucasian karate fighter, and is similar in concept to the finale to Jean-Claude Van Damme’s Kickboxer: Lee can’t win for fear of his girlfriend getting hurt, and then finally snaps and goes buck wild on his opponent. There are a number of sparring matches between Bruce Li and Ku Feng that are also fairly well done. To be honest, this is easily one of Bruce Li’s overall best physical performances and I don’t exaggerate when I say his kicks have never been better. With a member of the Yuen Clan choreographing the fights, Bruce Li gets to perform more acrobatic moves than normal.

As Brucesploitation films go, this one isn't all that bad. It has pretensions of being more than just your garden variety Bruce Lee imitator film, but doesn't trust its own premise enough to deliver on it. Nonetheless, there are enough quality fight scenes to make it worth a rent.