Part sports documentary, part biopic and part clip job, Fist of Fear, Touch of Death is all steaming pile. It’s also all comedy — and not that intentional kind, either. Matthew Mallinson’s film is so inept and pathetic on every level that it deserves to be known as the Plan 9 of not just Bruceploitation pics, but martial arts movies in general.
As it begins, ’70s trailer narrator king Adolph Caesar (Oscar-nommed for A Soldier’s Story, but certainly not for this) discusses the big impending karate championship at Madison Square Garden, where someone will walk away with the honor of the title of Bruce Lee’s successor. But will they also walk away with Lee’s curse — aka the Touch of Death? That’s the conflict set up by the — how you say? — “script,” and then completely discarded 80 minutes later.
Credited as “Hammer, the Ladies Man,” Fred Williamson (Vigilante) wakes up next to some skanky white ho in a hotel room. He’s gotta get to the Garden for the match, but his mattress partner wants to “make it a six-pack,” not fully satisfied with being Hammered the mere five times prior. In a running gag, the Hammer is continually mistaken for singer Harry Belafonte. This, my friends, is what the dictionary means by “funny.”
After giving Williamson a lift to the Garden and then interviewing him, Caesar brags about having discovered Lee, and then gives us the whole story about Lee’s pre-stardom years, courtesy of poorly dubbed black-and-white sequences. In these, Bruce often dreams of his great-grandfather’s prowess as a samurai warrior, which we see flashbacks of, courtesy of color clips from 1971’s kick-ass Invincible Super Chan with a fighting midget and a guy who uses an abacus as a weapon.
Caesar briefly mentions Lee’s breakthrough role as Kato on TV’s The Green Hornet, and in present day, we see karate champ Bill Louie decked out as Kato, beating up would-be rapists in the park, killing one with hurled ninja stars. The whole ugly scene starts when some horny redneck, spotting a comely jogger, exclaims, “Shit! Fuckin’ cantaloupe tits!”
As for the much-discussed karate match, we see precious little of it, but that’s okay. At least we get to see a bit of one bout, ending with one guy’s eyes being ripped out of their sockets, complete with cartoon sound effects! So what the hell are you waiting for? —Rod Lott
From the Wahl Clipper Corporation, How to Choose, Grow & Style the Perfect Beard or Mustache is about welding and soldering. Ha! I kid. It’s about big, bushy collections of face pubes. 
