Big Trouble in Little China
Jack Burton's in for some serious trouble and you're in for some serious fun.
Country
Budget
$25 000 000
Revenue
$11 100 000
Director
Actors
Scenario
Producer
Larry J. Franco, Paul Monash, Keith Barish
Operator
Composer
Artist
John J. Lloyd
Audition
Editing
Short description
Big Trouble in Little China follows Jack Burton, a truck driver who gets pulled into a conflict far beyond his everyday world. After helping his friend Wang Chi collect his fiancée, Miao Yin, from the airport in San Francisco, Jack sees her taken by the followers of Lo Pan, an ancient sorcerer who needs a woman with green eyes to regain a physical form. With Wang and attorney Gracie Law, Jack ventures into Chinatown and the underground realm beneath it, where magic, spirits and warring factions stand between him and the rescue.
John Carpenter directed the film, the eleventh of the twenty-two features he has directed in chronological order, coming between Starman and Prince of Darkness. David Z. Weinstein and Gary Goldman wrote the screenplay, Larry J. Franco produced, and Kurt Russell leads a cast that includes Kim Cattrall, Dennis Dun, James Hong, Victor Wong and Kate Burton. With 53 credited cast members and 82 credited crew, it was a sizable production, though its reported 25 million dollar budget was not matched by its worldwide gross of about 11 million dollars.
Audience response has been warmer: on IMDb it holds 7.2/10 from roughly 166,000 votes, and on TMDB 7.2/10 from about 3,500 votes, while the critics' rating stands at 6.3/10 from 69 reviews.
What's left behind the scenes
- The final song was written and performed by "The Coupe De Ville," featuring John Carpenter, Nick Castle, and Tommy Lee Wallace.
- According to John Carpenter, post-production took four months.
- A literal translation of the Chinese characters in the opening credits is "Evil spirits are causing a great commotion in a small spiritual place."
- The characters on Shen's bus read: "Uncle Egg's Tours guarantee a good time."
- Although Kurt Russell was John Carpenter's first and only choice for the lead role, the studio considered Jack Nicholson and Clint Eastwood.
- According to commentary on the John Carpenter and Kurt Russell DVD, the film's script was originally written in the style of a Western, but Carpenter later decided to move the setting to the present day.
- During filming, Kurt Russell was ill with the flu, so the sweat on his body in some scenes is genuine, caused by a high temperature.
- In the scene where Jack (Kurt Russell) attempts to enter the brothel, he is wearing the same clothes as Russell's character in the film "Used Cars" (1980).
- A martial arts expert who developed kickboxing technique for the famous Bruce Lee participated in the choreography of the stunts and fight scenes.
- Producers Barish and Monash first offered the project to Carpenter in July 1985.
- Initially, Russell was not interested in the project, as he didn't know if he could play Jack in a way that would be interesting to the audience. But after talking to Carpenter and reading the script several times, he liked the idea of playing a character with so many flaws.
- Before filming began, Kurt Russell ran for two months to lose weight.
- The studio was in a hurry and feared that filming might lead to a serious budget overrun, so they hired John Carpenter, giving him only 10 weeks for preparation. The filming crew, led by Carpenter, rehearsed hand-to-hand combat scenes for about a week.
- During the wedding ceremony, when Lo Pan plunges the Love Needle into Miao Yin’s hand, James Hong actually pricked Susie Pai quite badly. In the film, you can notice that she even jumps during this scene.
- The film was originally planned to be shot under the title 'Buckaroo Banzai vs. The World Crime League', which was intended to be a sequel to 'The Adventures of Buckaroo Banzai Across the 8th Dimension'. However, after a complete rewrite of the screenplay, the resulting film had a completely different plot.
- The character in the triangular hat who throws lightning served as the prototype for Raiden – a character from the 'Mortal Kombat' game series.
- 'Big Trouble in Little China' was a debut for Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, who played one of the numerous minor villainous characters in the film.
- 20th Century Fox studio wanted to exclude the names of screenwriters Gary Goldman and David Weinstein, who wrote the first draft of the script, from the credits and press releases. The studio wanted Richter to be credited as the screenwriter. In March 1986, the Writers Guild of America ruled that Goldman and Weinstein should be credited as the scriptwriters. However, Richter was included in the credits as the author of the screenplay adaptation. John Carpenter was disappointed with the Guild’s decision, as he wanted Richter to be credited as the sole screenwriter.
- Russell believed that the film would face distribution difficulties, as it featured only a handful of non-Asian actors, and the plot was based on Chinese legends, folklore, and the history of Chinatown.
- Dennis Dun’s character in the film Year of the Dragon impressed John Carpenter. Therefore, the director met with the actor twice before offering him the role of Wang Chi, just a few days before the start of pre-production. The martial arts that permeated the film were not difficult for Dun, who had been studying them since childhood.
- Jackie Chan was considered for the role of Wang Chi, but decided to decline after the box office failure of several of his films and focus on his career in Hong Kong and the film Police Story.
- The studio pressured Carpenter to cast rock star Grace Lau as Jack’s lover, but Carpenter chose Kim Cattrall. The studio was not thrilled with this idea, as Kim Cattrall was known as a comedic actress thanks to the film Police Academy.
- John Carpenter learned that Eddie Murphy's new project, titled "Golden Child," which featured similar themes, was scheduled for release around the same time as "Big Trouble in Little China." The director demanded explanations from the film's director and Paramount Pictures. He didn't believe the simultaneous appearance of a film with the same setting and subject matter was a coincidence, as no major studio had released a film on this topic in the past 20 years. And certainly not at the same time. To beat the competition, production on the film began in October 1985, to be ready by July 1986, five months before the premiere of "Golden Child."
- Production designer John J. Lloyd recreated parts of "Chinatown," including three-story buildings, roads, lanterns, and sewers. This was necessary to create visual effects and stage complex fight scenes that would have been difficult to film on location. This forced the director to shoot the film in 15 weeks and spend $25 million. Carpenter said that in order to save money, he used very cheap materials for the shooting, such as trampolines, ropes, and wires.
- Just before his death, Lightning forms a Chinese character that means "carpenter." John Carpenter is the director of this film.
- John Carpenter was dissatisfied with the company responsible for the visual effects, believing they had taken on too many projects, which led to some material being cut from the film. Richard Edlund, head of Boss Film Studios, which handled the visual effects, said there were no problems working on the film, and it was one of his favorites of the time, with the exception of "Ghostbusters." The visual effects cost $2 million, which Edlund considered quite low. One of the most challenging effects for the film was creating the flying eyeball that spied for Lo Pan. The structure was operated by several puppeteers with dozens of cables to control its expressions. It was filmed using a special system built specifically for it.
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