The Deaths of Bruce and Brandon Lee

While working on his sixth film, Game of Death, Bruce Lee passed away in 1973. It was all but inevitable that he would pass away due to cerebral edema. He left a wife and two kids behind. One of their kids, Brandon Lee, is well-known for following in his father's acting career. As most of us are aware, Brandon Lee unfortunately passed away as well in 1993 while filming The Crow.

Brandon made five movies before The Crow. A prop gun that was not properly prepped for usage led to his death. The dummy rounds were created from modified live rounds, and when the blank was shot, one of the dummy bullets was still in the chamber, leading the blank to shoot like a typical gun.

A scene that almost identically replicated this line of events occurs on screen in Game of Death, which turned out to be a curious coincidence. Bruce Lee plays an actor in the movie. The props guy instructs the actors and crew on how to use the prop pistol on the set of the movie in which he has a starring role. He says that even if the gun is filled with blanks, they should only shoot upward because a piece of paper could accidentally discharge and do damage to someone. Lee would have lived if the actor on the set of The Crow had complied with those directions.

The actor who shot Bruce Lee's character in the movie then purposefully switched the fake round for a real bullet while using the prop gun. The parallels between what transpired onscreen and what his son went through 20 years later were uncannily prescient.