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FINISHING THE GAME
Directed by Justin Lin.
Produced by Julie Asato, Salvador Gatdula & Lin.
Written by Josh Diamond & Lin.
Director of Photography Tom Clancey.
Edited by Greg Louie.
Music by Brian Tyler.
Released by IFC First Take.
Country of Origin: USA. 88 min. Not Rated.
With: Roger Fan, Sung Kang, James Franco, McCaleb Burnett, Jim Parrack, Dustin Nguyen, Cassidy Freeman, and M.C. Hammer.

Game of Death was never finished, a film for which star Bruce Lee shot somewhere between 20 and 30 minutes of footage with fight scenes in his iconic yellow-and-black striped suit (you all know it from Kill Bill Vol. 1). Production of the film resumed years later as the Bruce Lee craze went into overdrive in the ‘70s, but with a whole other storyline involving Lee’s character and another cast, with look-alikes, stand-ins, stills, and close-ups of Lee used to fill in the gaps. It’s not quite the monstrosity one might expect, and the fight scenes do remain spectacular, but it goes without saying that it was a marketing ploy put to the ultimate test.

Director Justin Lin could have made a whole movie about the making of the reassembled Game of Death, but instead he produced, as he put it in the press notes, a film about denial, or rather a mockumentary really, about the casting process and who stood up to the task of being the next Bruce Lee.

Breeze Loo (Roger Fan, excellent at playing a typical self-absorbed star) has appeared in many Bruce Lee knock-offs, despite claiming he has never seen one of Lee’s movies; naïve Cole Kim (Sung Kang), straight out of the Deep South, has perfected his English by watching Mr. Rogers; Troy Poon (Dustin Nguyen), a has-been star of a TV cop-show, now makes his mark on TV as a delivery; and also auditioning are oddballs Raja (a deadpan Mousa Kraish) and white boy Tarrick Tyler (McCaleb Burnett).

As we meet each new figure, we get drawn into the denial inherent in actors who either haven’t made it yet, or have and are too proud to say that they aren’t halfway as talent as they think are. We see Tarrick in his past job sporting a duck suit; Breeze Loo’s previous and badly-dubbed films – they’re maybe the funniest scenes, however ridiculous and crude; as well as the TV work of Troy, who had the catch phrase, “I ain’t gonna do your laundry,” which he delivered to his co-star (James Franco), each in tacky 70s attire.

The only drawback, and it’s not a very damaging one, is that after a while the aura of “the 70s” (in quotes as the filmmaker plays up the era’s pop culture) gets a little less fresh, with the music score accentuating the funk. Still, there’s enough bad puns (“Fist of Führer!” is one of the Breeze Loo flicks) and even moments of sympathy as Cole goes from being a happy-go-lucky kid in Hollywood to a perturbed mo-fo during his screen test, blowing everyone away – a significant tribute to the Christopher Guest mold of self-conscious mockery. And where else will we get to see M.C. Hammer playing a pimp-turned-talent manager! Jack Gattanella
October 5, 2007