“The Steel Fisted Dragon” Theatrical Poster
AKA: A Fistful of Dragon
Director: Iksan Lahardi
Cast: Steve Lee, Enden Marlinda, Ronald Kansil, Vita Fatimah, Chan Lau, Johnny Hong Kong
Running Time: 78 min.
Paul Bramhall
In 1977 the Bruceploitation genre was already alive and well, with guys like Bruce Li bursting onto the scene with 1975’s New Game of Death and Bruce Le unleashing digit related mayhem in 1976’s Bruce’s Deadly Fingers. While the name Bruce combined with variations of how to spell Lee seemed to be the way forward for any potential Bruceploitation star, at some point producers must have realised they’d maxed out. So it was, the new era of Bruceploitation star was born, with the surname Lee remaining intact, but being called Bruce no longer a requirement. Korea stepped up to give us the legendary Dragon Lee with his Cheshire Cat smile and moves accompanied by various blip and bloop sound effects, and Indonesia unleashed the one and only Steve Lee!
In fact Indonesia already had its own kung fu star at this point in the form of Larry Lee, who in the same year starred in Four Shaolin Challengers and Black Belt Karate (in which he wore a similar red tracksuit to what Bruce Lee wore in Longstreet). However it was Steve Lee who’d be marketed and sold as Indonesia’s own Bruce Lee imitator, which he did a whole 2 times, first in Cobra from the same year, and second in The Steel Fisted Dragon. After that he’d disappear into obscurity, which makes him an anomaly amongst his Bruceploitaiton luminaries, as most of them starred in more movies and had longer careers than the Little Dragon, but not our friend Steve.
For his sophomore outing Lee plays a kung fu master whose mother and girlfriend are murdered by the local bad guys, leading him to go on a revenge fuelled rampage. That’s your plot right there. I actually gave some serious thought to how I could describe it in at least 2 sentences, but really there’s nothing more to it than that. Understandably depressed, Lee’s friend (who sports a Hitler moustache, a fashion choice I felt for sure was foreshadowing a villainous betrayal later on, but no, turns out Hitler moustaches were just trendy in 1977 Indonesia) insists he should cheer up by finding a job. I get the logic, but on the other hand if Lee was an unemployed bum before tragedy struck, it seems unlikely that a job would makes his existence any more cheerful after losing his nearest and dearest.
Thankfully we don’t spend too much time with Lee wallowing in self-pity (although if he did, he’d be perfectly entitled to), as this is 70’s South East Asia meaning denim clad villains are never in short supply. I confess I’ve never seen Cobra, so The Steel Fisted Dragon was my first taste of Lee and I like his approach to Bruceploitation. Rather than imitating the Little Dragon’s fighting style, Lee uses his own brand of kung fu beatdown, but infuses his fights with a liberal (and I mean liberal) dose of Bruce Lee styled high pitched howling and the occasional mannerism (like a flick of the nose). Amusingly at one point he gets so badly beaten that he has to recuperate, with his wounds represented by Enter the Dragon style scratches on his chest. Somehow seeing the overly familiar scratches put someone completely out of action made Lee seem like a bit of a wimp.
The villain is particularly villainous here, keeping a number of girl’s captive for his own nefarious purposes, and keeping an eye on them all with a camera set up in the room they’re kept in. In one scene his secretary calls him to advise he has a visitor who he asks to show in, and in-between the secretary leaving and the visitor walking in he switches on the TV just to briefly check out what’s going down in the room. I guess it was the closest thing to steaming on demand in the 70’s. At one point the ladies even get into a full-on brawl with each other, sending pieces of clothing everywhere. You’d think this blatantly criminal activity would factor into the plot at some point, but it never really does. Go figure.
Indonesian kung fu flicks of the time had a habit of bringing over Hong Kong talent either to co-star or even work behind the scenes. The previously mentioned Black Belt Karate cast fellow countryman Lo Lieh as the villain of the piece, and a year later Chen Kuan Tai would pair up with local star Billy Chong to star in and direct Invincible Monkey Fist. In The Steel Fisted Dragon we get Chan Lau, old groper himself from The Dragon, the Hero. In fact Lau worked on both Cobra and The Steel Fisted Dragon, featuring in front of the camera as well as being on fight choreography duty. I’m not sure if we ever needed to see a guy like Lau in a sex scene, but The Steel Fisted Dragon comes close to giving us one, mercifully cutting away just at the right moment (especially since we later learn that he’s the master of the iron finger technique!).
While not a prolific fight choreographer by any means (prior to this the only 2 movies he’d choreographed solo were the Taiwan-Korea co-production Magic Curse and Hong Kong flick Moon and Stars, both from 1975 and non-martial arts related), here he definitely puts his best foot forward. I’m sure there was also input from the local Indonesian talent, as the action is often quite raw and brutal. In one tussle Lee rips one poor lackeys’ eyes out (both of them!) and tosses them away, and in another he hangs one guy upside down with his hands, while proceeding to repeatedly kick him in the head! A stunning display of brutality and balance at the same time.
The real action highlight in The Steel Fisted Dragon is an extended fight against multiple attackers in a warehouse that acts as a precursor to the finale. It’s a scrappy ordeal that some will likely argue goes on for longer than it needs to, but I enjoyed the gratuitous length of the scene. Set in a location with a seemingly unlimited amount of breakable wooden crates to fall into or on top of, various spades randomly scattered around just waiting to be utilised as weapons, and plastic drums which appear to be full of acid, all are put to effective use. Interestingly the action incorporates an element of grappling, with arm and leg locks being used to dispose of some lackeys, and no Bruceploitation flick would be complete without some nunchucks action. Here we get a pair of lackeys brandishing the iconic weapon, who of course can’t keep their hands on it for long.
Cast as a kind of kung fu assassin, we also get a Chan Lau versus Steve Lee face off which delivers the goods, with Lau channelling his inner-Hwang Jang Lee, and at one point brandishing a pair of tonfas (which Lee amusingly counters with a large tree branch). As scrawny as Lau may be, he actually manages to look believably dangerous here, a flurry of kicks, iron finger pokes (the grass they fight on suffers considerably), and tonfa thrusts, it’s a welcome one on one fight compared to the many 1 versus many battles that make up the majority of the action. Events eventually culminate with Lee attempting to make an escape with the main villain’s sister (don’t ask) on a boat, only for him to end up using the wooden paddle as the main weapon in the final fight rather than sailing off into the sunset. Still, watching people get smacked across the head with it is arguably more entertaining.
It’s a shame Steve Lee didn’t go onto make more movies. Well, let me just take a step back there, firstly it’s a shame that he was named Steve Lee in the first place! But he was an actor who clearly had screen presence and, while not the most graceful of performers, clearly had the moves to look like an effective fighter onscreen. Perhaps he decided a life of hitting people over the head with tree branches, spades, and paddles wasn’t for him, and that’s fair enough. As a slice of 70’s Bruceploitation though with an Indonesian twist, The Steel Fisted Dragon delivers the goods thanks an almost constant stream of action and ridiculous dubbing. Let’s be honest, sometimes that’s all you need from a kung fu flick.
Paul Bramhall’s Rating: 6.5/10
