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Timing Of Brandon Lee's Death

MrRING

MrRING

Android Futureman
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I was rereading accounts of Brandon Lee's death recently, and I was surprised by a basic change in the accounts.

The major sources online all seem to tell the story of how the crew noticed almost immediately that Lee was actually injured and rushed him to the hospital.

But my memory of the story at the time was that Brandon was a known practical joker and that after he was shot, he moaned in pain in the floor for roughly 10 minutes before people realised he wasn't joking. The story I remember goes further to saying that if they had acted on the shot immediately, he might have lived.

Does anybody else remember that version of the story as being the one that was reported? Was that just sensational journalism, or is the current version of events whitewashed?
 
I don't recall ever hearing the practical joker story, even at the time, and I vividly remember hearing the reports of his death on the radio.

Surely there's a better conspiracy to be drawn from the early deaths of Brandon and his father that that? Not that I can think of one...
 
gncxx said:
I don't recall ever hearing the practical joker story, even at the time, and I vividly remember hearing the reports of his death on the radio.

Surely there's a better conspiracy to be drawn from the early deaths of Brandon and his father that that? Not that I can think of one...
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Wasn't there something about Bruce Lee having upset the Triads, or something and some martial arts expert having put a death grip on him. You only have to suppose that either THEY decided to aveng themselves on Lee's son as well, Brandon had been investigating his father's deatha and found out the TRUTH....etc.

Easy, peasy this conspiracy stuff...
 
I just finished watching 'Game Of Death', the posthumously-released Bruce Lee movie that only contains about ten minutes of actual Lee footage. The rest is a mish-mash of standins and dubbed archive footage with a new plot. The plot involves Lee's character being shot by a real bullet swapped in for a blank on a movie set — eerily similar to how Brandon Lee died.
 
Brandon wasn't killed by a real bullet, it was some wadding that was caught in the barrel that acted like a bullet when the blank was fired. Nothing deliberate. But yeah, an interesting almost-coincidence nonetheless.

Game of Death is basically the Plan 9 from Outer Space of martial arts movies, though funnily enough the main stand-in was Yuen Biao who became a star in his own right in the 1980s.
 
There are oodles of websites out there about the supposed Lee curse. With Bruce having died so young and then Brandon following at a young age too, what else could it be but a conspiracy of sort, according to some?
Not to make sweeping generalizations (though I'm about to), but Hong Kong loves/loved a good story and Chinese are often a superstitious lot. Mix in rumours of an affair (Bruce, I'm talking about) and you've got a rumour mill that still grinds on to this day.
Brandon, being the son of Bruce, a handsome lad and an up and coming star in his own right meets an untimely death and a way that could have been preventable. More fodder. Was it an accident? Was he murdered? Was it paypack? Sins of the father? Etc etc etc.
From my perspective, Bruce died from a cerebral edema caused by a reaction to medication he took for a headache. No more, no less. Brandon's death was the result of an unfortunate accident. Unfortunate and tragic.
Brandon's sister, Shannon now continues on the Lee family legacy. I've chatted to her a few times through social media and she is the nicest person which I have to admit, pleases me immensely.
 
The best Bruce myth was that he was killed by a "death touch", a strike with the palm of the hand from an expert in martial arts which would kill him later, when he thought he was safe.
 
MrRING said:
I was rereading accounts of Brandon Lee's death recently, and I was surprised by a basic change in the accounts.

The major sources online all seem to tell the story of how the crew noticed almost immediately that Lee was actually injured and rushed him to the hospital.

But my memory of the story at the time was that Brandon was a known practical joker and that after he was shot, he moaned in pain in the floor for roughly 10 minutes before people realised he wasn't joking. The story I remember goes further to saying that if they had acted on the shot immediately, he might have lived.

Does anybody else remember that version of the story as being the one that was reported? Was that just sensational journalism, or is the current version of events whitewashed?
Click to expand...

I also remember the news of Lee's death, but never heard of the practical joke angle. However, I also recall the actor Jon-Erik Hexum dying in a similar way - he shot himself on the set of his TV show, with a pistol loaded with blanks, apparently as a joke. He didn't realize the paper blanks could cause serious injury.

Could you have conflated the two stories, being that they were similar?
 
GNC said:
The best Bruce myth was that he was killed by a "death touch", a strike with the palm of the hand from an expert in martial arts which would kill him later, when he thought he was safe.
Click to expand...
A death-punch story was used in an episode of Quincy from 1977 - about the death of a young Asian martial arts star. I wonder whether this may have been conflated with the death of Bruce Lee in some people's minds, or whether the story was already doing the rounds and was an influence on Quincy (which is very likely); or maybe a bit of both...
 
maximus otter said:
... And resurfaced in Kill Bill: Volume II as the "Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique".

maximus otter
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Being an enthusiastic martial artist in my teens and early 20s, I was also an avid collector of martial arts books. I had some quite rare texts, now long lost but one was on ''Dim Mak'' or the touch of death. Essentially causing delayed death or disability by the seemingly innocent striking of pressure points. I recall it being a complex system and one not too practical.
 
GNC said:
Brandon wasn't killed by a real bullet, it was some wadding that was caught in the barrel that acted like a bullet when the blank was fired. Nothing deliberate. But yeah, an interesting almost-coincidence nonetheless.
Click to expand...
Almost right. What I understand is that the gun was filled with the normal blank wadding, plus the shell of a fake bullet that had been put in the barrel at the front so they could get a close-up of the bullet in chamber from the front of the gun. They forgot to remove the fake bullet tip after getting the close-up, so when the blank was fired, it propelled the fake bullet tip into Brandon's abdomen.
 
This discussion is so absorbing. Even down to today, the death of Bruce Lee and Brandon Lee are still intriguing in China.
 
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