Rating summary

Movie		3.0
Video		3.0
Audio		3.0
Extras		2.5
Overall		3.0

The Clones of Bruce Lee Blu-ray Movie Review

Reviewed by Jeffrey Kauffman June 23, 2024

Note: This film is available on Blu-ray as part of Severin's The Game of Clones: Bruceploitation Collection Vol. 1.

When Severin Films released Kung Fu Trailers of Fury and Return of Kung Fu Trailers of Fury several years ago, I'm sure I wasn't the only one initially thinking, "Well, that's a stupid idea for a release", only to have the sheer lunacy of the trailers assembled in both collections "fight back" against that assessment, as if to say in response, "Yeah, well who's stupid now?" In fact, both Kung Fu Trailers of Fury and Return of Kung Fu Trailers of Fury were kind of deliriously enjoyable in their own slapdash way, and those releases evidently were one of the inspirations for a full on collection of so-called "Brucesploitation" films, this time offering the actual films in addition to their trailers. The goofily affable Michael Worth, who has contributed so many fun commentaries through the years to various kung fu films on Blu-ray, is your "host" of sorts here, offering introductions to all the films and commentaries for many of them. If none of these films is ever going to be acclaimed as an unappreciated masterpiece, and if both video and audio on many of the films in this set might be charitably termed problematic, merely having these films in high definition will be alluring, and an absolute glut of other supplemental material is included as well, making this a probable "must have" for a certain demographic.

If watching Enter the Clones of Bruce is a great way to begin getting through the bizarre pleasures of The Game of Clones, in terms of actual Bruceploitation efforts, the somewhat similarly named The Clones of Bruce Lee pretty much instantly defines just how gonzo this subgenre frequently is. Fans of Brucesploitation may already be aware of the glut of supposedly similarly named martial arts performers who were tasked with picking up Lee's mantle (and/or nunchuks), but this film actually gives you three of them, Bruce Le, Bruce Lai and Dragon Lee. The "plot" is almost hysterically over the top, with a mad scientist creating clones of Bruce Lee. The mad scientist being, well, mad and all means that his initial plans to send the various Bruces hither and yon fighting evil then turns into a kind of Battle Royale and/or The Hunger Games, with our would be doppelgängers duking it out amongst themselves. Mix in a copious amounts of gratuitous female nudity, and the Brucesploitation Circus gets off to a rousing start, one that Michael Worth hilariously calls the "Plan 9 of Outer Space of Brucesploitation movies".

The Clones of Bruce Lee Blu-ray Movie, Video Quality 

The Clones of Bruce Lee is presented on Blu-ray courtesy of Severin Films with an AVC encoded 1080p transfer in 2.35:1. In his introduction, Michael Worth states this transfer was culled from two 35mm prints, one German and one Italian. Expectations need to be set accordingly for virtually all of the films in this set, and for those who are going to take the time to read all of the reviews of the films in this set "in order", this will just be the first of many times I'm going to mention various issues that afflict a lot of the transfers. First, one of the pluses: there's some generally decent color on hand quite a bit of the time, even if temperatures and densities can noticeably vary, and with an overall kind of dowdy brown faded quality. Some of the minuses include pretty rampant damage, though certainly not as severe as is seen in some of the other films in this set, and a somewhat curious absence of the same sort of thick grain that is seen in some of the other transfers. One of the things I'll be discussing in several of the transfers is some anamorphic oddness which doesn't only pertain to "typical" bugaboos like squeezing at the edges of the frame (something that's definitely on display here), but what I can only compare to the x and y axes of a rectangle being slightly tweaked to make it a parallelogram, so that the entire frame is kind of tilted or skewed. You can see one example of this in screenshot 2, but those of you who parse your way through all of the other reviews of films in this set will be accorded further examples in various other transfers.

The Clones of Bruce Lee Blu-ray Movie, Audio Quality 

The Clones of Bruce Lee features a DTS-HD Master Audio 2.0 Mono track. While there's some noticeable background hiss, the track is surprisingly full bodied a lot of the time, especially with regard to some of the scoring. As with many of the tracks offered in this set, there is an overall boxy sound that can be especially noticeable during effects. Also as with several tracks in this set, the high end can be pretty brash and bright. Unsurprisingly, the dubbing is hilariously bad in terms of matching lip movements. Optional English subtitles are available.

The Clones of Bruce Lee Blu-ray Movie, Special Features and Extras 

• Audio Commentary With Michael Worth and Frank Djeng, Co-Producers of Enter the Clones of Bruce; Bruce Lee Historian Brandon Bentley; Chris Poggiali, Co-Author of These Fists Break Bricks; Matthew Whitaker, Co-Host of The Clones Cast; Action Film Historian Mike Leeder; Stunt Coordinator/Author John Kreng; and Rick Benn, Brother of Actor Jon T. Benn


• The Big Boss Remembered – Interview With Actor Jon T. Benn (HD*; 16:35) is a kind of elegiac piece by Michael Worth.


• Severin's Kung Fu Theater With Actor/Director/Bruceploitation Expert Michael Worth (HD; 1:54) offers a brief introduction. This is accessible as either a standalone supplement or under the Play Menu, where it's authored to lead directly to the feature.


• Trailer (HD; 1:42)

*720

The Clones of Bruce Lee Blu-ray Movie, Overall Score and Recommendation 

When in his introduction Michael Worth advises to "put your mind aside", that's pretty much spot on, but this is a simply spectacularly gonzo way to get your actual Brucesploitation Film Festival underway after the appetizer of the Enter the Clones of Bruce documentary. This offers reasonably decent technical merits, which is frankly about as good as you're going to get in this set, but the supplements are a lot of fun.