Bruce Lee is praised for his martial arts skills in both the East and the West, but his popularity in Hong Kong is also rooted in his nationalism, in the sense that his characters stood up for Chinese people and the Chinese race. Fist of Fury (1972), Lee’s second martial arts film, is literal in that respect, telling the story of a young Chinese kung fu expert who takes revenge on the members of a Japanese karate school that murdered his sifu (master). When the film opened in Hong Kong, a scene in which he smashes a sign that calls China “the sick man of Asia” drew loud cheers from the audience. Perhaps the best of Lee’s four completed martial arts films, Fist of Fury takes place in Shanghai in the early 1900s , a time when foreign powers had taken control of the major ports and established the city’s International Settlement. The film is a straightforward revenge drama, but the racial politics and locale provide some distinction. When the master of his kung fu school dies in suspicious circumstances, Chen Zhen (played by Lee) suspects it’s the doing of a rival Japanese karate school. As the foreign powers discriminate against the Chinese, the police won’t intervene, and Chen decides to avenge the honour of his sifu himself. The rest of his school feels revenge is dishonourable, so he finds himself on his own. The movie was directed by veteran filmmaker Lo Wei, who shot Lee’s first martial arts hit, The Big Boss (1971). But Lee did not rate Lo’s directorial skills highly and filmed the fight scenes himself. The action scenes are phenomenal, featuring overhead camera angles that show the fight as a whole, powerful close-ups and even an unusual subjective tracking shot from the point of view of one of Lee’s enemies as he attacks. Lee was known for the power of his punches and the full force of them can be experienced, while his speed and agility are superbly displayed. It’s fascinating to watch his fluid and mixed jeet kune do technique go up against the “hard” style of karate. Lee makes prolific use of the nunchaku and a sequence in which he employs them to defeat a karate master wielding a samurai sword is skilful beyond belief. Outside the action, Fist of Fury is also remembered for a scene in which Chen kicks apart a sign reading “No Dogs or Chinese Allowed”, and for the final freeze-frame, in which he martyrs himself by leaping at a group of gun-wielding foreigners who have come to arrest him. Fist of Fury will be screened on Friday at the Hong Kong Film Archive, in Sai Wan Ho, as part of the Multifarious Arrays of Weaponry in Hong Kong Cinema programme.