Opening statement: The content of this article is written with authoritative sources combined with personal opinions, and the source and screenshot of the literature have been marked at the end of the article, please be aware.
Preface
Bruce Lee symbolizes an era in the history of world cinema, and when you think of him, you will think of Chinese kung fu, as a generation of martial arts masters, he can be called an invincible opponent in the world in his heyday.
But his wife Linda revealed in her later years: He can't actually beat everyone, and there is one kind of person who is the opponent he is afraid of encountering.
What kind of opponent can make Bruce Lee afraid?
Hit out of Chinese kung fu
Before the advent of Bruce Lee, Chinese Kung Fu was not famous in the world, and in the eyes of most foreigners at that time, Chinese Kung Fu was nothing more than the existence of fists and embroidered legs, and it was of no use at all.
It was at this time that Bruce Lee appeared in front of the world, using his ability to wash away the sick image of Chinese in the eyes of foreigners, and to reach the top of the world stage with the prestige of a strong kung fu man.
Bruce Lee has starred in more than 30 movies and 6 TV series in his short life, and with these modest but classic works, he has gained hundreds of millions of fans around the world.
Even today, more than 50 years after his death, there are still many people who miss him, and his impact is not only a generation, let us recall his short but incomparably wonderful life today.
In 1940, the flames of Japanese aggression were burning on the land of the motherland, and the people everywhere were struggling to make a living. Born in Foshan, Guangdong, Li Haiquan is performing Cantonese opera in Foshan, and his performance is humorous and is known as "one of the four famous uglies of Cantonese opera".
In order to escape the war, Li Haiquan fled from Foshan to Hong Kong with his family, but the war soon reached Hong Kong, and he could only flee to the United States with his wife and three daughters.
On November 27, 1940, Li Haiquan's wife, He Jintang, gave birth to a son in a hospital in San Francisco's Chinatown, while he was still performing at the Chinatown Theater in New York, 9,000 miles away from San Francisco.
In order to visit his wife and son, he hurried back and named his son "Li Zhenfan". Because San Francisco was called "San Francisco" by the local Chinese at that time, he hoped that his son could make a name for himself in this American city.
When Li Zhenfan was 1 year old, he was brought back to Hong Kong by his parents, and he lived in Hong Kong for 18 years.
Because his father is a Cantonese opera actor, Li Zhenfan has been making movies since he was a baby, playing a baby in "Golden Gate Girls".
Until 1950, 10-year-old Li Zhenfan participated in the movie "Xiluxiang", in which he played one of several protagonists. Because he was born in the Year of the Dragon, he took "Bruce Lee" as his stage name.
Since his student days, Bruce Lee has shown his differences, he doesn't like reading at all, his grades can be called a mess, but outside of reading, he has endless strength.
At the age of 12, Bruce Lee entered a Catholic school, where the teachers taught in English, and he gave up studying because he could not understand anything.
After studying here for a while, Bruce Lee, who had nowhere to vent his energy, became obsessed with fighting, so he approached his parents and said that he wanted to learn martial arts.
After learning tai chi with his father for a while, he quickly grew tired of the slow movements. He wanted to learn martial arts faster and more powerfully.
Bruce Lee's mother was very supportive of his idea, so she paid for him to pay for his tuition and found a master to teach him martial arts, and that master's name was Ip Man.
Bruce Lee worshiped under Ip Man to learn Wing Chun, and when he met something he really loved, Bruce Lee's body exploded with all his energy, and he spent all his time learning martial arts, never shouting tired or skipping class.
At that time, Bruce Lee had only one belief in his heart, that is, he must win the fight, in order to make his skills more masterful, he not only learned Wing Chun, but also practiced Hung Boxing, Shaolin Boxing, Jiequan, Poke Foot and so on.
In the 1957 Hong Kong school-level boxing competition, Bruce Lee won the championship of the junior group in one fell swoop.
In addition to martial arts, Bruce Lee is also quite talented in acting, and before he was 18 years old, he had already made more than a dozen movies, and was known as the "genius child star" in Cantonese films.
In 1959, Bruce Lee was already 18 years old, and at this time he needed a different space to display his talents.
Break into America
The 18-year-old Bruce Lee's grades are still terrible, and he is injured from frequent fights, so in order to get him a better environment, his family decided to send him to the United States to study.
Because he was born in San Francisco, he has automatically acquired American citizenship and has no problem going to study in the United States. In 1961, he was admitted to the University of Washington to major in drama, where he also met his wife, Linda.
During his time at university, he organized and established the martial arts hall of the "Zhen Fan Guoshu Museum", where he not only practiced kung fu by himself, but also took other classmates to learn Chinese martial arts.
Here, Bruce Lee integrated all the martial arts he had learned before, and also fused various attack moves to create a unique type of martial art of his own - Jeet Kune Do.
In 1964, Bruce Lee and Linda were married in a church in Seattle. As time went on, Bruce Lee's martial arts gym had more and more students, and he opened a second martial arts gym in Oakland, California.
While teaching students in the martial arts gym, Bruce Lee also has to accept the challenge of various kickers at any time, many martial arts masters want to come to compete with him, no matter where the martial arts experts can not beat Bruce Lee, his reputation is growing.
Hollywood
In 1965, at the age of 25, Bruce Lee came to the door of Fox Film Company in the United States, where he left a wonderful audition video. Prior to this, his first child, Li Guohao, had just been born in California.
With Bruce Lee's excellent performance in the audition, Fox quickly signed him an actor contract. In 1966, he participated in the TV series "The Green Hornet", in which he played the supporting role Kato, and achieved widespread success.
A year later, he participated in the TV series "Batman". In the same year, his third martial arts gym was established in Los Angeles, and later at a World Karate Championship, Bruce Lee showed off his original Jeet Kune Do, which caused a huge sensation.
Although Bruce Lee's kung fu caused a huge sensation in the United States, he was still discriminated against. At that time, Warner was preparing to film a TV series "Kung Fu", and Bruce Lee confidently went to the interview, but was unexpectedly brushed off.
This hit Bruce Lee hard, he knew that Chinese people would be discriminated against in Hollywood, and if he wanted to make a film that was truly unique, he had to return to Hong Kong.
It just so happened that Hong Kong's Golden Harvest Film Company sent an invitation to cooperate at this time, and Bruce Lee signed a contract with them for two films after a period of thinking.
In 1971, Bruce Lee returned to Hong Kong and filmed his first film, "Brother Tangshan," which was a huge success in Hong Kong, grossing $3 million at the box office and shaking the entire film industry.
In the film, Bruce Lee showed his original three-legged slalom chain kick and volley flying foot, which left a deep impression on all audiences.
With the popularity of this movie, the shooting of the next movie was quickly determined, and Golden Harvest Film Company quickly found Bruce Lee to shoot the second movie "Jingwumen" in 1972.
With the success of the previous film, the investment in this film has doubled compared to the previous one, and the return it has brought is also even more amazing, this film broke the Asian record at the box office of the year, with more than 4.4 million Hong Kong dollars.
The success of these two films directly established Bruce Lee's status, and also in 1972, Bruce Lee wrote, directed, and starred in his pinnacle work "Raptors Across the River", which won a box office of 5.27 million Hong Kong dollars.
With the success of these films, Bruce Lee finally successfully knocked on the door of Hollywood movies, and Warner invited him to star in "Enter the Dragon", which was his first starring role in a Hollywood film, but it was also the last.
Bruce Lee attached great importance to the filming of this film, and he hoped to open up the American film market through this film. In order to better complete this work, he did not hesitate to stop filming "Game of Death" written and directed by himself.
In the end, the $800,000 film brought a huge return to Warner, taking $25 million at the box office in North America alone, and the number of box offices worldwide is even more staggering.
Because of his existence, an English "kung fu" was created because of him, and since then he has become synonymous with kung fu in the eyes of foreigners, and he has become a superstar in Hollywood and even the world film industry at that time.
Surprising Death
He was only 33 years old that year, and there was still countless glorious history waiting for him to create, and countless honors waiting for him to receive, but all this came to an end on July 20, 1973.
Late at night on the 20th, Bruce Lee suddenly fell into a coma after sleeping, and the doctor finally announced his death after some shooting, and everyone could not accept this sudden news.
The people waited for the forensic doctor to provide them with the final results, and after the forensic examination, it was confirmed that he had not been murdered, and there were no toxins in his body, and later, after an autopsy, the medical examiner reported acute cerebral edema.
This is actually not Bruce Lee's first coma, before that, Bruce Lee suddenly fainted on the set of "Raptors Across the River", when he was rushed to the hospital and was treated before escaping.
After Bruce Lee died, his family buried him in a cemetery in Seattle, USA, and what people don't want to see is that just 20 years later, Bruce Lee's only son Li Guohao was buried next to his father at the age of 28.
Although Bruce Lee has passed away, the martial arts influence he brought to people will not go away, and he has a single number of fans and followers around the world, who miss and imitate Bruce Lee.
In her later years, Bruce Lee's wife wrote a memoir to recall Bruce Lee in her own mind, and wrote the book "Bruce Lee in My Eyes".
mentioned in the book that she once asked Bruce Lee: "What kind of opponent are you most afraid of?" He replied, "I'm not afraid of people who know 10,000 moves, I'm most afraid of opponents who practice 10,000 moves." ”
In fact, Bruce Lee is such a person, who strives for perfection in martial arts and practices every move seriously, so that he can reach a point where no one can reach the status of martial arts.
source
The 50th anniversary of Bruce Lee's death: There is a "legend" called Bruce Lee-Chinanews.com