Press Release - Bruce Lee & Beyond Announcement (May 2025)

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Denver Film Media Contacts:

Denver Film Kicks Off AAPI Heritage Month With A Series Look At “Bruce Lee & Beyond”

All May long at the Sie FilmCenter, presenting Bruce Lee’s influential martial arts features, the films they were inspired by, and the films they inspired

(BRUCE LEE AND BEYOND assets link, BRUCE LEE AND BEYOND trailer link)

DENVER – MAY 1, 2025 – Denver Film today announced the kick off of its latest repertory film series – Bruce Lee & Beyond – exploring the scope of “One Man’s Impact On Cinema”. With that man being Bruce Lee, the Chinese-American martial arts master and charismatic actor who forever changed the landscape of martial arts action in cinema within just four films – THE BIG BOSS, FIST OF FURY, WAY OF THE DRAGON, and ENTER THE DRAGON – before his untimely passing in 1973. He never finished work on GAME OF DEATH but after a major overhaul it was posthumously released in 1978, cementing Lee’s superstar status forever. All five films will screen in this series along with two classic King Hu “wuxia” titles that came before Lee – DRAGON INN and A TOUCH OF ZEN – and a cache of films that were inspired by Lee and his success: THE CLONES OF BRUCE LEE, Berry Gordy’s THE LAST DRAGON, Jackie Chan’s first two films HALF A LOAF OF KUNG FU and THE FEARLESS HYENA, THE MYSTERY OF CHESS BOXING (the movie that inspired the Wu-Tang Clan), and perhaps the most Lee inspired films of them, Quentin Tarantino’s KILL BILL VOL. I and VOL. II, presented as a Double Feature on rare 35mm prints. The films will screen exclusively at Denver Film’s year-round home the Sie FilmCenter, 2510 E. Colfax, throughout May.

“It is not often that we get to chart the path of one person’s impact on cinema and the reverberations of his footsteps on a genre and a whole industry,” said Sie FilmCenter Artistic Director, Keith Garcia. “But Bruce Lee is that one and it seemed only correct to honor him for Asian American and Pacific Islander Heritage Month and let his story and its effect on the martial arts industry unfold in an action packed and thrilling series all month long at the Sie FilmCenter.”

The full schedule and tickets are on sale now at denverfilm.org. Ticket prices range from $12 – $15 for General Admission with deeper discounts available to Denver Film Members.

ANNOUNCED FILMS IN PROGRAMS:

THE BIG BOSS
Director: Lo Wei
Wednesday, May 7, 7 p.m.
Enter a legend. Bruce Lee’s return to the Hong Kong film industry after a decade in America proved to be his big breakthrough, launching him to instant superstardom and setting a new standard for kung fu heroics. He commands the screen with his gravitas and explosive physicality in the role of a Chinese immigrant working at a Thai ice factory and sworn to an oath of nonviolence. When he discovers that the factory’s ruthless higher-ups are running a secret heroin ring and offing their own workers, his commitment to pacifism is put to the test. With his undeniable charisma and fluid, lightning-fast martial arts style, Lee is a revelation, streaking across the screen with a speed and power the likes of which had never been seen before.

THE CLONES OF BRUCE LEE
Director: Joseph Kong Hung & Nam Gi-nam
Friday & Saturday, May 9 & 10, 9:30 p.m.
Bruce Lee has just died. Fortunately, a team of brilliant scientists have found a way to use his brain tissue to create a trio of clones to fight crime in Southeast Asia. Bruce 1 (Dragon Lee) is sent to act in a film produced by a gold smuggler who plans to kill him on camera. Meanwhile, Bruce 2 (Bruce Le) and Bruce 3 (Bruce Lai) are sent to Thailand to defeat the evil Dr. Ngai, a mad scientist with plans to dominate the world with his bronze automatons. One of the more ridiculous titles in the Bruceploitation canon, THE CLONES OF BRUCE LEE is an unforgettably insane martial arts classic starring no fewer than four Bruce Lee lookalikes.

DRAGON INN
Director: King Hu
Saturday, May 10 at 12 p.m.
The Chinese Wuxia (martial arts) picture was never the same after King Hu’s legendary Dragon Inn. During the Ming dynasty, the emperor’s minister of defense is framed by a powerful court eunuch and executed, and his family is pursued by secret police. In the ensuing chase, a mysterious band of strangers begins to gather at the remote Dragon Gate Inn, where paths (and swords) will cross. This thrilling landmark of film history returns to the screen in a new, beautifully restored 4K digital transfer, created from the original negative.

A TOUCH OF ZEN
Director: King Hu
Sunday, May 11, 12 p.m.
In King Hu’s grandest work, Yang (Hsu Feng), a fugitive noblewoman at risk of being captured and executed, hides in a small village and then must escape into the wilderness with a shy scholar and two aides. There, the quartet face a massive group of fighters and are joined by a band of Buddhist monks surprisingly skilled in the art of battle.

FIST OF FURY
Director: Lo Wei
Wednesday, May 14, 7 p.m.
Bruce Lee is at his most awe-inspiringly ferocious in this blistering follow-up to his star-making turn in The Big Boss, which turned out to be an even greater success than its predecessor. Set in 1910s Shanghai, Fist of Fury casts Lee as a marital arts student who, after his revered master is murdered by a rival dojo of Japanese imperialists, sets out to defend the honor of both his school and of the Chinese people, with his fatal punch his preferred weapon of choice. Elevating Lee to a hero of near folkloric proportions, this historical revenge fantasy blends its stunning action set pieces with a strong anti-colonialist statement and a potent dose of the fierce cultural pride which the actor embodied.

THE LAST DRAGON
Director: Michael Schultz
Friday & Saturday, May 16 & 17, 9:30 p.m.
Leroy Green (Taimak), a young martial artist living in New York City, trains tirelessly to attain the same level of mastery as the great Bruce Lee. One night, his life changes forever when he rescues television personality Laura Charles (Vanity) from evil businessman Eddie Arkadian (Chris Murney). Impressed by Leroy’s bravery, Laura falls for Leroy — but to keep her safe, he will have to defeat a gang leader named Sho’nuff (Julius J. Carry III), the self-styled Shogun of Harlem.

THE WAY OF THE DRAGON
Director: Bruce Lee
Saturday, May 17, 12 p.m.
After the back to back triumphs of The Big Boss and Fist of Fury, Bruce Lee was given the chance to write, produce, and direct his third outing as a martial arts superstar. He used the opportunity to add a touch of goofily entertaining comedy to the typically action-driven proceedings, which find him playing a rigorously trained martial artist who travels from Hong Kong to Rome to help his cousin, whose restaurant is being threatened by a gang of thugs. Reaching new heights of virtuosity, Lee unleashes an astonishing display of nunchuck-swinging, fly-kicking mayhem, all culminating in one of his most breathtaking fights: an epic gladiatorial death match with Chuck Norris in the Roman Colosseum.

HALF A LOAF OF KUNG FU
Director: Chan Chi-Hwa
Sunday, May 18, 12 p.m.
Like a live-action comic book, this antic farce lets Jackie Chan, choreographing his own fight sequences, cut loose with a wild parody of the martial-arts genre. He plays a bumbling wannabe kung-fu master who, when he assumes the identity of a dead hero, finds himself embroiled in a series of absurd misadventures and the search for a pair of mystical artifacts. Cartoon sound effects and send-ups of everything from Popeye to Jesus Christ Superstar are part of the lighthearted fun—not to mention Chan fighting a bald adversary with his own wig!

ENTER THE DRAGON
Director: Robert Clouse
Wednesday, May 21, 7 p.m.
Bruce Lee explodes onto the screen in the film that rocketed him to international superstardom, Enter The Dragon. Recruited by an intelligence agency, martial arts student Lee (Lee–Fists of Fury, The Chinese Connection) participates in a brutal tournament at a remote island fortress in an attempt to gather enough evidence to convict the international drug-trafficker responsible for the murder of Lee’s sister. In the now-classic fight-to-the-death finish, two men enter a mirrored maze, but only one will exit… NOTE: Though uncredited, future superstars Chuck Norris, playing a messenger, and Jackie Chan, as a henchman, appear in this 1973 martial arts spectacular.

Film Intro by Sara Moore, Executive Director, Colorado Dragon Boat

KILL BILL VOL. I + II Double Feature on 35mm Film
Director: Quentin Tarantino
Friday, May 23, 6 p.m. and Saturday, May 24, 12 p.m.
Tarantino’s legendary saga of one woman’s path to vengeance, presented on 35mm film and BACK TO BACK (with an intermission of course).

In VOL. I – A former assassin, known simply as The Bride (Uma Thurman), wakes from a coma four years after her jealous ex-lover Bill (David Carradine) attempts to murder her on her wedding day. Fueled by an insatiable desire for revenge, she vows to get even with every person who contributed to the loss of her unborn child, her entire wedding party, and four years of her life. After devising a hit list, The Bride sets off on her quest, enduring unspeakable injury and unscrupulous enemies.

In VOL. II – The Bride (Uma Thurman) picks up where she left off in volume one with her quest to finish the hit list she has composed of all of the people who have wronged her. Leaving several dead in her wake, she eventually tracks down the infamous Bill in Mexico. Using skills she has learned during her assassin career, she attempts to finish what she set out to do in the first place.

With an all-star cast including Uma Thurman, Lucy Liu, Vivica A. Fox, Michael Madsen, Daryl Hannah, David Carradine, Chia-Hui Liu, and Michael Parks.

THE MYSTERY OF CHESS BOXING
Director: Joseph Kuo
Friday & Saturday, May 23 & 24, 9:30 p.m.
The original Ghostface Killer is on the loose! A vicious villain with an unstoppable five element technique, Ghostface is killing off all his old rivals. Meanwhile, a young student tries to learn kung fu and is taken under the wing of an old chess master. The basics of chess prove to be the same as the basics of fighting, and eventually the heroes will have to fight Ghostface Killer, who verbally insults his opponents as he annihilates them. Directed by Joseph Kuo (Seven Grandmasters, 18 Bronzemen).

THE FEARLESS HYENA
Director: Jackie Chan
Sunday, May 25, 12 p.m.
An auteur emerges as Jackie Chan—working for the first time as director, in addition to serving as co-writer, lead actor, and martial-arts choreographer—takes full charge of his on-screen image. Perfecting the archetypal Chan character, he stars here as a rapscallion student of his martial-arts-master grandfather (Hong Kong cinema legend James Tien) who uses his kung-fu prowess to fight challengers for money—until a personal tragedy forces him to get serious. Experimenting with various lenses and camera setups, Chan maximizes the action’s visual impact, while unleashing some of his most innovative fight choreography in a stunning, whirlwind display of “emotional kung fu.”

GAME OF DEATH
Director: Robert Clouse
Wednesday, May 28, 7 p.m.
Released five years after Bruce Lee’s death, this eccentrically entertaining kung fu curio combines footage from an unfinished project directed by and starring Lee with original material shot by Enter the Dragon director Robert Clouse to create an entirely new work that testifies to the actor’s enduring place in the pop culture imagination. Using stand-ins, doubles, and archival footage to compensate for Lee’s absence, Game of Death follows a martial arts movie star who, when he’s threatened by a cutthroat crime syndicate intent on controlling his career, must take his skills from the soundstage to the streets. It all builds to an exhilarating climax that is pure Lee: a tour de force of martial arts mastery in which the legend himself, clad in iconic yellow jumpsuit, fights his way up a multi-level pagoda, with a towering Kareem Abdul-Jabbar among his formidable opponents.

About Denver Film

Denver Film has been transforming and entertaining the Colorado community through the power of diverse voices in film since 1978. Operating as the region’s only membership-based, 501(c)(3) nonprofit film institution, Denver Film has grown into a signature cultural organization in the West, screening international and independent movies found nowhere else in the region.

Serving more than 100,000 patrons annually through 600-plus screenings that include year-round programming at Denver Film’s flagship home the Sie (pronounced SEE) FilmCenter, the annual Denver Film Festival celebration, the iconic Film on the Rocks program at Red Rocks Amphitheater, and Spotlight Festivals including CinemaQ, Women+Film, and the Colorado Dragon Boat Film Festival. Spotlights highlight underrepresented communities and foster inclusivity. Denver Film works to build resilience across all of its programming and events by amplifying diverse voices, promoting equity, and fostering community connections.

For more information or to explore the full suite of Denver Film programming, events, and ticketing visit: denverfilm.org.