The Clones of Bruce Lee
1977; directed by Joseph Kong

Sporting five -- that's right, count 'em, five -- Bruce Lee impersonators, The Clones of Bruce Lee is stuffed to the gills with Bruceploitation. Some of the more masochistic readers out there might think that this is a great thing. But, honestly, once the gimmick wears off and the obvious ineptitude of the film-makers becomes apparent, getting through a viewing of this movie may be too much for you unless you're a fan of basically seeing the exact same fight scene done over and over again.

The movie starts with a chap named Collin from the SBI (yes, not the FBI, the SBI) contacting a professor to make clones of the recently-deceased Bruce Lee. Three clones are made, which are conveniently named Bruce #1 (Bruce Le), Bruce #2 (Dragon Lee), and Bruce #3 (Bruce Thai). After being trained by people in the SBI (including Bruce Liang and Bolo Yeung), the Bruces (or is it Brucii?) are sent out to do SBI's dirty work. Bruce #1 goes after a corrupt movie producer, while #2 and #3 head to Thailand, where they meet up with Mr. Chuck (Bruce Lai) before taking out Dr. Nye, who is trying to take over the world via an army of "bronze" soldiers -- which, of course, are just really a bunch of out-of-shape guys hit up with gold spray paint.

The general craziness of the proceedings buoy the production for a bit. The unintentional (?) hilarity brought forth by stuff like the pasta strainer slapped on the clones' heads to give the professor the ability to command them, as well as the exceedingly god-awful dubbing, where even the actors speaking in English sound like they just picked up "Hooked on Phonics" yesterday, supply enough enjoyment for the first forty-five minutes or so. But then things hit a wall. You can only see a Bruce Lee lookalike participate in sloppy fights so many times before it becomes boring. Even after the film-makers try to liven things up with some extremely gratuitous (but still welcome) full frontal female nudity, the viewer would be forgiven if they feel the need to start hitting the fast-forward button.

Ultimately, despite the attempted clustering of Bruce Lee-inspired goodness into one big awe-inspiring package, this picture ends up being more than a bit pedestrian and trite. Major Bruceploitation fans will probably get a kick out of The Clones of Bruce Lee, but your average viewer is going to see the movie for what it really is -- an attempt to cash in on the corpse of Bruce Lee that deserves to stay fully and completely buried in the 99 cent bargain bin from whence it came.

RATING: 4