QWhat are the differences between the old British VHS and the Uncensored Version?
AIn the time of VHS all Bruce Lee classics were only released as more or less censored versions in the UK. As one can imagine, the nunchakus used by Bruce Lee weren't popular with the censors of the BBFC and in Game of Death the fighting sequence on the first floor at the end of the movie had to be removed. This combined with the already very few appearances of the real Bruce Lee make the VHS-release a complete dealbreaker. Besides that, some other short scenes that contain easily imitable fighting moves, such as blows against one's temple, headbutts or testicle squeezing also had to be removed. Worth noting are several scenes from the opening and closing credits where such shots have been replaced with "freeze-frame" images to bridge the time difference. A detailed comparison between both versions with pictures can be found here.
QIf Kareem Abdul-Jabbar Was Only In The Archive Footage, Why Is He In Some Scenes That Were Never Filmed On The Archive Footage?
AJust like Bruce Lee, He also had cut-out boards of him. If you watch closely though, you can see in the scenes of him that aren't inside the Pagoda, he does not move at all. In addition, a stand-in, whose face was hidden by dark sunglasses and shadows, was used as was done with Lee (although Abdul-Jabber did record his own dialogue which was then lip-synched by the stand-in). In Lees original story line all of the guardians of the pagoda are seen in combat training outside (the pagoda) in broad daylight with one exception "Kareem" who could not leave (the pagoda) because he was blind! which worked really well into the script by keeping his identity secret because he was the unknown opponent with a weakness. Did you know there were 3 clues to Kareem's blindness in The Game of Death, the first clue is that he wore dark glasses in a dark environment (a room lit only by candlelight) which worked really well because many black men do ware dark glasses regardless, the second clue the floor below Kareem's (the temple of gold) was lit only by red light so no harmful white light would enter into his floor, and the third clue was that Kareem is the only guardian who is never seen outside the pagoda because he couldn't leave it! Bruce Lee (Hai Tein) could not figure any of this out untill he smashed the pagoda widows by mistake. Would, could anyone out there work that out?
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