The Silent Flute
**½/**** Image A- Sound A Extras A-
starring David Carradine, Anthony De Longis, Carl Maynard, Erica Creer
screenplay by Stirling Silliphant and Stanley Mann
directed by Richard Moore
by Travis Mackenzie Hoover You can't exactly call The Silent Flute a good movie. This "mystical" martial-arts extravaganza, an early pet project of Bruce Lee that he abandoned after becoming too famous to care, is pompous in its pretensions and shallow in its follow-through, which under normal circumstances would damn it to well-deserved ridicule. But there's something strangely poignant about its stumblebum view of Zen, filtered as it is through a bunch of well-meaning Hollywood westerners bending over backwards to honour something they don't understand. The sheer earnestness of the thing wins your begrudging respect–it's brave enough to be what it wants to be even if it doesn't really know what that is. Somewhere, Jack Smith is smiling.
The Silent Flute takes place somewhere "that never was but always is," i.e. in cheap, disparate Israeli locations, the first of which is the setting for a kung fu match whose victor will set off to find a mystic named Zetan and claim his Book of All Knowledge. Cord (Jeff Cooper) is the most promising candidate, although he makes the mistake of beating his felled opponent and is consequently disqualified. Armed with a bit of wisdom from a blind fighter (David Carradine), Cord embarks on the quest regardless, encountering along the way an unbeatable fighter from a half-monkey race (Carradine again), a dissipated "Oriental" hedonist (Carradine again), and a black-clad beast-man (guess who?), providing him with many simplistic morals to learn, many trials to overcome, and many excuses to spring into action.
Whatever your opinion of Bruce Lee (or David Carradine), there's no denying the abbreviated nature of the "profound" ideas or the ramshackle nature of the production. There's a distinct Robert E. Howard feel to the enterprise as our hero wanders in his leather briefs across ancient lands, only to engage in stilted conversations about the meaning of whatever: The Silent Flute is a nerdy adolescent fantasy, complete with cool speechifying and eventual sexual wish-fulfillment (punished with an inexperienced boy's guilt shortly thereafter). Still, the total belief in the silly plot and cheapjack production values somehow enhances the film's appeal. There's something touching about the desire for mastery and "wisdom" at the core of the movie, and the naked need that triggers those desires–camp without irony you respect instead of mock.
Sadly, The Silent Flute is too uneven to make it as a whole film. Cooper simply lacks the charisma (and is too damned old) to pull off his tabula rasa seeker role, while Carradine seems to be on autopilot in his multiple kung fu Alec Guinness turns. And the big secret of that book (involving a ludicrous Shangri-La headed up by Christopher Lee) is so obvious and anticlimactic that you're sure to slap your brow in frustration. The bashfulness of the effort is pervasive enough that you won't hold too much against it, though, as it speaks to needs that go beyond mere narrative coherence. If only the filmmakers had understood those needs and voiced them with articulation.
With a track record as spotless as Blue Underground's, a DVD transfer that's barely less than perfect is immanently forgivable. While The Silent Flute's 1.78:1, 16×9-enhanced image has an almost absurd lustre during daylit scenes, an occasional and mysterious blue stripe mars a handful of nighttime sequences. (Sounds like neg damage. -Ed.) The Dolby 2.0 mono sound is killer, sharp without being tinny and round without being too soft. Extras are as follows:
Commentary with director Richard Moore
Moore recounts his on-set experiences with Blue Underground's David Gregory. Not an especially aesthetic guy (as the film attests), Moore is all business when discussing the nuts and bolts of the production, including the genuinely ancient locations and the nationalist arguments between two generations of Israelis.
"Playing the Silent Flute": Interview with David Carradine (14 mins.)
Another of the company's famously candid interviews. Carradine waxes candid on a variety of subjects ranging from Bruce Lee's decline in civility to his own approach to character to the perils of working with fight choreographer Kam Yuen, who broke the actor's nose during the shoot.
Alternate Title Sequence (3 mins.)
The same gorgeous opening as before, except that the film is rechristened Circle of Iron (also the title that graces the front cover of this DVD).
Bruce Lee's Silent Flute: A History (text feature)
Lee authorities Davis Miller and Klae Moore retrace the script's tortuous path, from ambitious freak-out by Bruce Lee and friends James Coburn and Stirling Silliphant to the relatively subdued effort that reached the screen in the wake of Lee's passing. Lee comes off as a conceited jerk, having blown off this massive project because his old friends couldn't afford him. A necessary corrective to Lee idolatry.
First Draft Script
This DVD-ROM feature could be a fascinating counterpoint to the finished film–but I can't tell you because my computer crashed every time I tried to access it. Those with better systems are possibly in for a treat.
Thorough still and poster galleries, three TV spots, and The Silent Flute's theatrical trailer round out the disc.
97 minutes; R; 1.78:1 (16×9-enhanced); English 2.0 (Mono); DVD-9; Region-free; Blue Underground
