I Am Bruce Lee Page #7

For whatever reason, he did not warm up

and just... that was it.

He was in excruciating pain.

I said, "Where's Bruce?" They never

wanted to say he hurt his back,

because I knew he was working

on the screen scripts.

They told him that he was never

going to walk properly,

and forget doing any gung fu.

On the back of his business card

he wrote the words "Walk on".

He used to put the card on his bathroom

mirror and his doors and walls,

so everywhere he went in his room,

he'd see "Walk on".

So he'd get down

and start doing his stretching.

Bruce brought himself back

through rigorous rehabilitation.

I had a similar expression

when I would drive down to Torrance

to do my jiujitsu class every week.

His expression was "Walk on"

and mine was "Walk in the front door".

I had every excuse on the way down

to go back.

My stomach hurts. My arm hurts.

My knee's aching.

And I used to say, "Walk in

the front door. Walk in the front door. "

The end result of walking in that front

door 16 years was I got my black belt,

which I consider

the greatest achievement of my life,

apart from my children.

The back problem

was a constant problem in his filming

from day one after the injury.

Something he had to be careful about

and nurse each day

when he finished working.

And you push it out, but all the time

you are keeping the continuity going.

Bending, stretching.

He worked extremely hard.

Most of us, I think, don't know

what it is to work that hard.

My father went to India

with James Coburn

and the writer Stirling Silliphant.

They were scouting locations for a film,

The Silent Flute,

that my father had written

the treatment for

that he was really hoping

would come together,

because he was struggling at that point

in time to get a project going.

The Silent Flute could have

blasted Bruce into Hollywood big time.

This was going to be

the big breakthrough project.

This was going to put money in the bank

to pay the mortgage and all that.

But they couldn't find

the locations that they wanted.

Stirling and Jim

came back to Warner Bros

and said, "This is just not

what we're looking for in location. "

And then it all came crashing down.

That was such a disappointment to Bruce

because we were

banking on it, literally.

Bruce took a trip

back to Hong Kong to help his mom

with immigration into the United States.

He took Brandon took with him.

Brandon was five years old.

He wasn't working,

had no money. He dropped everything.

Closed his schools.

"I'm going to Hong Kong. "

The Green Hornet was at that time

showing on TV in Hong Kong,

only the people were calling it

The Kato Show.

They didn't care about Van Williams.

He was the biggest thing there.

He was greeted there

as a returning star.

That was the first time he thought,

"Wow. People recognise me here. "

"They remember me. "

He did a couple of interviews

on television shows.

Oh, yeah, that kid.

Now he's a big star in Hollywood.

So that was the first inkling

that maybe there would be

a future there in Hong Kong.

But he wasn't quite ready

to follow up on that.

Bruce Lee had a bit part,

or a supporting role,

in the Longstreet series.

And this had an enormous effect

on the audience. What was it?

I think the successful ingredient in it

was because I was being Bruce Lee.

- Yourself?

- Myself, right.

And did that part,

just expressed myself, like I say,

honestly expressed myself at that time.

He was very proud of Longstreet,

and it was very much from him

and his art and his thoughts.

Can you remember the lines

by Stirling Silliphant to...

- He's one of my students.

- Was he, too?

- Yes.

- You've had everybody as your student.

But some lines there

expressed your philosophy.

- I don't know if you remember them.

- I remember.

I said... This is what it is, OK?

If you try to remember, you will lose.

I said empty your mind.

Be formless, shapeless.

Like water.

Now, you put water into a cup,

it becomes the cup.

Put water into a bottle,

it becomes the bottle.

You put it in a teapot,

it becomes the teapot.

Now, water can flow or creep

or drip or crash.

Be water, my friend.

- Like that. You see?

- I see. I get the idea.

- A-ha.

- I get the power behind it.

The thing that I

got off him the most is the trust,

being able to trust your abilities

in each situation.

A lot of times

the game becomes too scripted.

When it's too scripted

and you start planning

for certain things to take place,

that's when I believe you're weak.

What he's saying

is that you have to adapt

to your surroundings, your environment.

James Coburn said,

"Look, man, the best thing you can do,

go back to Hong Kong, do what you do

best, come back, rock the world. "

James Coburn did tell Bruce

that he shouldn't keep doing TV,

that it would eat up his genius.

He had much more to offer the world and

he should hold out for starring roles.

Jimi Hendrix had to break away

and go to England to be recognised

as the rock star that he was.

Clint Eastwood,

he had a career out of Rawhide,

but it was the Italian Westerns

that really made his career.

Bruce ultimately had to go back

to Hong Kong

to be recognised

as the movie star he was.

Here's a plane ticket. Just go back

to Hong Kong for a few years.

You wouldn't want any trouble, huh?

That's one of the things

I admire most about him.

He said, "OK, the institution's

not gonna work for me. "

"I'll figure something else out. "

He just went to through back door.

Bruce made the first two pictures with

independent producer Raymond Chow

for $15,000 each.

That was... It was made in Thailand

in a small village in Thailand.

Bruce Lee plays a working-class hero.

He's from the land.

He's one of the folk.

But at the same time as that,

he's never one of the guys.

And this is why it was so successful,

as well as the brilliant choreography.

Bruce Lee completely changed the way

action scenes look today in cinema.

It's about making violence

look beautiful,

which may sound like a paradox,

it probably is,

but a director like John Woo,

he shoots a gunfight like martial arts.

It's a ballet. In terms of the craft

of filmmaking, that's a huge change.

But the Western movies really piss me

off. They chop 'em up so much.

Most of the scenes overzoom,

so you can't see what's going on.

Those guys have to go back

and watch Bruce Lee movies.

You can see these awesome moves

he's doing in their entirety.

You can have a shot that doesn't

have to last only a half-second long.

I never even thought about it

until I did this movie Haywire.

Now every time I see a movie, I'm like,

"Stop cutting away. "

"Oh, that's a stunt double. "

They were wonderful to watch.

No wires, no gimmicks, no quick cuts.

You get an actor to portray that,

you're gonna have to do quick cuts.

Bruce Lee set a new baseline.

Every piece of film fight choreography

has been influenced by Bruce Lee,

whether the people involved

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