And so there are hours of Zapruder-esque YouTube videos dedicated to Lee's fighting prowess, bottomless Reddit threads obsessed with this nerdy, needy question. He left us longing - in that way he was one of the great actors of his era. If, off screen, it turned out he wasn't so dangerous after all, so masterful, we'd feel duped. When watching his films, one feels the nostalgist's urge to vindicate old affections. He makes you want to believe he's the real thing. Few actors have ever exuded as much physical charisma on screen as Lee. When Bruce Lee died at 32, on the eve of his first international hit, 'Enter the Dragon,' whatever he might have become lapsed into what might have been, into the realm of rumor and wish fulfillment and conjecture.Īnd perhaps no question about Lee is as trivial yet ardently pursued as this: Could Bruce Lee win a real fight? It's in some ways predictable that fans hungrily debate the skills of the man who refined and mainstreamed the martial arts film as we know it. SOME CAREERS HAVE the good fortune of ending too soon - they petrify into myth. Watch 'Be Water,' an ESPN 30 for 30 film chronicling Bruce Lee's life, on ESPN+.

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Bruce lee chuck norris