June 9: Junesploitation’s topic of the day — as suggested by F This Movie— is Fred Williamson! We’re excited to tackle a different genre every day, so check back and see what’s next.

Adolph Caesar — the man whose voice told us “A mind is a terrible thing to waste” and the trailer for Dawn of the Dead — is standing outside Madison Square Garden where a tournament has been set up to decide the new king of martial arts in the wake of the death of Bruce Lee. Never mind that Bruce died in 1973 and this is six years later.

This event is actually one of the Oriental World of Self Defense shows put on by Aaron Banks, who is all over this movie. Starting in 1966 as small shows on the east coast, the shows grew in popularity until they ran monthly at Madison Square Garden.

Banks also is given to saying some of the dumbest things ever in this movie, like how he knows that Bruce was killed by the “Touch of Death” which even got reported in Black Belt magazine years later, with them claiming that  Lee died from “a delayed reaction to a Dim Mak strike he received several weeks prior to his collapse.”

The quivering palm, as they also call it.

The same power that Count Dante claimed that he had.

Like the Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique.

Then they edit old Bruce Lee footage to make you think he agrees.

If you are offended by the truth being punched, kicked and chopped, you might not enjoy this movie. If you love the tabloid world of grindhouse pseudo-reality films, get on board.

After that, we see how hard it was for Fred Williamson to get to the show. He wakes up late — in bed with a gorgeous woman, as he should — before battling his way through traffic and people who think that he’s Harry Belafonte. That’s an easier way to MSG that Ron Van Clief has, as the star of The Black Dragon — and a man who fought Royce Gracie in a UFC match at the age of 51 — has to battle through four muggers.

Then it’s time for us to discover the story of Bruce Lee from this movie in a way that has never been told this way again. Using footage from a 1957 movie The Thunderstorm, we learn that a young Bruce was karate obsessed and wanted to live up to the samurai legacy of his great-grandfather. You may at this point wonder if the people who made this knew that samurai were from Japan.

Using footage from The Invincible Super Chan, we discover the life of that Chinese samurai before Bruce comes to America and becomes an actor despite the fact that he was in movies from his toddler years and was in 27 movies before The Big Boss in 1971. It ends with an actor named Bill Louie dressed up as Kato from the Green Hornet — Lee’s breakthrough in the U.S. — as he saves two women — one is Gail Turner, Patty from Don’t Go In the House — from being assaulted. Then he kills one of them with a shuriken.

Then we’re back in MSG and The Hammer tells us that the whole idea of a tournament to replace Bruce Lee is pretty stupid. Fred, you’re in the movie about it. You’re literally breaking kayfabe when you look at the camera and say, “Two guys fighting for Bruce Lee’s title that doesn’t even exist, I mean, that’s kind of absurd, isn’t it?”

Meanwhile, the karate match to determine the next martial arts superstar is really a boxing match. This is after a match where Bill Louie ripped out a man’s eyes and threw them to the crowd and suddenly in Italy, Lucio Fulci felt a twitch and wondered why he suddenly was interested in martial arts.

Also known as Dragon and the Cobra — perhaps to cash in on Williamson playing Black Cobra? —  this was released as a Sybil Danning’s Adventure Video title and man, that back title alone makes me lose consciousness. Maybe that’s Sybil using Dim Mak on me.

Matthew Mallinson only directed this film, but he also edited Tales of the Third Dimension, Unmasked the Idol, The Order of the Black Idol and Caged Fury. It was written by Ron Harvey, who help turn Zombie Holocaust into Dr. Butcher M.D. There’s a connection between that movie and this film, as Terry Levene produced Fist of Fear Touch of Death and he was the man behind Aquarius Releasing, He also owned the rights to the movies torn apart for this. A movie this absolutely scummy could only come from Aquarius Releasing, I guess.

This is a movie with the sheer balls to end with this line describing Lee in a movie devoted to people dressed like him, the actor redubbed saying things that he never said and then going through his best Brucesploitation clones: “He was the prototype. Everything else is just an imitation.”

You can watch this on Tubi.