Fist of Fury

Bruce Lee's second Golden Harvest picture and the one where the star and the politics fuse into something bigger than either. Set in Japanese-occupied Shanghai, it has Lee investigating the poisoning of his kung fu master and taking on the responsible Japanese dojo more or less single-handed, building to the demolition of a park sign barring Chinese and dogs. The plot is a straight revenge line, but the sight of Lee walking into a room full of enemies and walking out alone gave colonised audiences across Asia a jolt no Western film was offering them. Lo Wei directs functionally and stays out of the way, which is the right call when your leading man moves like this. The freeze-frame final shot is one of the great endings in the genre.