What if Bruce Lee had lived?
This is the question Hail to the Thief attempts to answer.
OPEN ON: the Hong Kong skyline just as the new day dawns. A man on a bicycle
enters the frame at left, heading first across the screen and then away from
us. When we can no longer see him, ZOOM IN just to the right of where
the man on the bicycle was last visible. MUSIC: faint chimes; SFX: chickens, children
yelling playfully at one another.
CUT TO: the close-walled interior of a live poultry shop. Quarters are
very close, even cramped, but the general atmosphere is intimate rather than
claustrophobic.
Chinese-language signs adorn the walls and are elucidated by subtitles as the
camera PANS 240 degrees, beginning with the far right wall - they
read "All
sales final," "no gambling," etc.
CUT TO the front entrance as seen from the back of the store, and ZOOM IN toward
the door. ENTER JACK CHO (Bruce Lee), a gambler in his mid-fifties. He wears
a polyester shirt unbuttoned to mid-chest, dark yellow-tinted glasses, and
tight-fitting slacks. He is perhaps chewing a toothpick, or smoking.
JACK CHO: I need to buy a chicken!
BUTCHER: Get out of here, can't you read the signs? [He points toward a
Chinese-language sign just above his scale, which a subtitle informs us reads "All Sales
Final."]
JACK CHO: All sales final??? [begins laughing, at first ominously, then
gradually with less control until he is giddy] All sales final? Aaaaaah, oh, my God,
all sales final? They...and then you...[he leans up against the wall to prevent
himself from falling over, now helpless with laughter]
BUTCHER: [Comes out from behind the counter, side-hugs JACK] Yes, you're right! "All
sales final," indeed!