Monday, February 5, 2018

Challenge of the Tiger - Bruce Le (1982) - Jockey Clube de Macau, Taipa

In one of the more bizarre moments of the film, the cast and crew appear to gatecrash the 2nd Anniversary celebration of the Macau Jockey Club (well, strictly speaking it was the "Trotting Club" at the time) and mingle with the crowds. The most weird thing about this is that the various celebrities seen in the section - probably unbeknownst to them - actually are credited in the films cast list on IMDB. So we see Morgan Fairchild with her beau, Craig Denault, followed by Jack Klugman (Quincy) and Jane Seymour. Bruce even walks up to the latter two for a quick chat and they all look very confused about what's going on.

Another confusing aspect of this is that the Macau Jockey Club was supposedly started in 1980, but this clip is showing the 2nd year celebration. There are 2 possible scenarios: 1. The 2nd anniversary sign above the entrance was a prop (feasible but makes me wonder why they chose "2nd" anniversary as opposed to what should be the inauguration) or 2. The Jockey Club was in fact started in 1978 contrary to what wikipedia states (always a possibility) and this really was the 2nd anniversary celebration. In my opinion either is as likely as the other. Perhaps someone with more information will be able to let me know (comments and email always open).

Edit: see the comment below, the film was made in 1982 and now everything makes more sense. I've updated all the titles to reflect this now.

The offending sign showing the "2nd Anniversary"

And the final shot shows the type of racing that the club was originally involved in - trotting - essentially a race with each horse pulling a small cab behind. For someone who gets bored watching horse racing, this looks like a complete snoozefest so I'm not surprised they changed it to standard turf racing after a very short time and the trotting bit was binned.

2 comments:

Killer Metor said...

The film itself mentions 1982 in the dubbing - the 1980 release date given online is just wrong.

Phil said...

Thanks for the comment. That, of course, makes more sense. I’m a bit embarrassed I didn’t even consider it. Cheers, Phil

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