50 Fun Facts About Big Trouble in Little China

Who directed Big Trouble in Little China?

It fulfilled his long-standing wish to make a martial arts film after falling for Hong Kong cinema in film school.

In which year was Big Trouble in Little China released?

It opened on July 2, in 1,053 theaters, sixteen days before Aliens arrived to swallow the summer.

What is Jack Burton's job?

He narrates his own legend over the CB radio while hauling freight.

What is the nickname of Jack Burton's semi-trailer truck?

Carpenter's title theme shares the name and was partly inspired by ZZ Top's 'Just Got Paid'.

Who plays Jack Burton?

He had already made Elvis, Escape from New York and The Thing with Carpenter.

Which two stars did Carpenter want for the lead before the studio pushed its rising star?

Neither was available, and the studio needed a name to compete with Eddie Murphy in The Golden Child.

The star modelled Jack Burton's bravado on the screen persona of which older actor?

Reviewers noticed: the Toronto Star called it 'a great John Wayne imitation' with a satiric edge.

Who plays Wang Chi, Jack's friend whose fiancée is kidnapped?

He was cast only days before shooting and had performed in Chinese opera as an adult.

Which actress plays lawyer Gracie Law?

She insisted the character was 'the brains' to Jack's brawn and not a damsel in distress.

Which actor plays the sorcerer David Lo Pan?

He also played the eye maker Chew in Blade Runner and received a Hollywood Walk of Fame star in 2022.

Lo Pan needs to marry a woman with what feature to lift his curse?

Both Miao Yin and Gracie Law qualify, so he plans to marry one and sacrifice the other.

Which emperor defeated Lo Pan centuries ago and cursed him with incorporeality?

Lo Pan can borrow a decrepit body by supplicating the gods, but only the wedding sacrifice frees him fully.

What is Wang Chi's fiancée called?

The Lords of Death gang snatch her at the airport for her green eyes.

What are the names of the Three Storms, Lo Pan's supernatural warriors?

A 2012 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles episode borrowed the concept but swapped Rain for Wind.

The street battle Jack and Wang stumble into is between which two ancient warrior societies?

It erupts out of a funeral procession, and Jack's truck is stolen in the chaos.

How do Jack and Wang first get into Lo Pan's front business?

Rain subdues them almost immediately, and they end up tied up meeting the elderly David Lo Pan.

Which magician pours Jack and Wang a courage potion before the final battle in Big Trouble in Little China?

He also opens the film reassuring a lawyer that 'Jack Burton is a man of courage', a prologue the studio demanded.

What does Jack do at the start of the climactic wedding fight?

Carpenter described the movie as being about a sidekick who thinks he is the leading man.

How does Jack finally kill Lo Pan?

Jack's first throw misses; it is Lo Pan's return throw that he catches. 'It's all in the reflexes.'

What happens to Thunder when he finds Lo Pan dead?

Lightning is later crushed when Egg Shen drops a stone statue on him.

In the final scene, what is revealed to have stowed away on Jack's truck?

Jack has just turned down Gracie's offer to ride along, saying he eventually rubs everyone the wrong way.

The original screenplay by Gary Goldman and David Z. Weinstein was set in what period?

It was a Weird West story titled 'Lotus' with a cowboy hero named Wiley Prescott.

Which screenwriter rewrote Big Trouble in Little China, turning the cowboy hero into a blowhard trucker?

He got only an 'adaptation by' credit after the Writers Guild protected the original writers.

The rewrite man was offered the director's chair because of his previous film. Which one?

He turned it down, preferring smaller movies; Dennis Dun took the Wang role partly because he loved Buckaroo Banzai.

The studio rushed the film into production to beat which similarly themed Eddie Murphy movie to theaters?

Carpenter had been offered that film too, and came to see the two as 'basically the same'.

How many weeks of preproduction did Carpenter get?

Fox hired him specifically because of his reputation for working fast.

Where was most of the film shot?

Production designer John Lloyd rebuilt Chinatown with three-storey buildings, streetlights and sewers.

Who was the film's martial arts choreographer, who also appears as a Chang Sing warrior?

Carpenter said the fights used 'every cheap gag — trampolines, wires, reverse movements and upside-down sets'.

Which company handled the visual effects?

Its head Richard Edlund called it the company's favourite film after Ghostbusters.

The 'Guardian', Lo Pan's floating scout, is a creature covered in what?

Designed by Screaming Mad George, it took about 60 artists and cost over $100,000.

Lo Pan's old-age makeup was inspired by Dick Smith's work on which film?

Steve Johnson led the effect, along with the Wild-Man and Thunder's explosive death.

Who collaborated with Carpenter on the synthesizer score?

Carpenter wanted to avoid what he called 'rinky tink, chop suey music' and went for rock and fantasy instead.

The Coup De Villes, who performed the closing-credits theme, were Carpenter and which two friends?

Wallace was the second-unit director; Castle had played Michael Myers in Halloween.

What was the film's North American gross, against a budget of roughly $19-25M?

The flop left Carpenter so disillusioned he went back to independent filmmaking.

Which blockbuster opened sixteen days after Big Trouble and is blamed for eating its audience?

Carpenter and Russell discuss it on the DVD commentary, along with Fox's marketing mishaps.

How many stars out of four did Roger Ebert give the film?

He liked the 'visually spectacular' opening half-hour but felt the film repeated itself.

Which famously harsh writer praised the film as 'a cheerfully blathering live-action cartoon'?

He said it had some of the funniest lines spoken by any actor that year.

Which publisher's 2014 Big Trouble in Little China comic was co-written by Carpenter?

It later crossed Jack Burton over with Snake Plissken in Big Trouble in Little China/Escape from New York.

In 2015 which star began developing a remake, later reworked as a sequel, with himself as Jack Burton?

Carpenter stayed 'ambivalent' and never met with him about it.

Which director cited Big Trouble in Little China as an influence on Thor: Ragnarok?

An American hard rock band also named itself Lo-Pan after James Hong's villain.

Where did the film rank on Empire magazine's list of the 500 Greatest Movies of All Time?

Not bad for a picture Fox could not sell in 1986.

What is the name of Gracie Law's journalist friend who joins the rescue plan?

The group first meets at Wang's restaurant, where they hatch the scheme to break into a brothel to find Miao Yin.

Which friend of Wang's do Jack and Gracie meet at Wang's restaurant?

The restaurant becomes the gang's base and the place they escape back to in Jack's truck after Lo Pan's lair collapses.

What approval rating does the film hold on Rotten Tomatoes?

The site's consensus calls it 'a joyously overstuffed blend of comedy, martial arts, and supernatural mayhem' that races along on Russell's rowdy charm.

A 2016 Boom! Studios crossover comic teamed Jack Burton with which other Carpenter hero?

The limited series paired the trucker with the Escape from New York antihero, both originally played by Kurt Russell.

Kim Cattrall took the role of Gracie partly to shake off comedy typecasting from which two films?

She had earlier been pigeonholed as a dramatic actress from TV work, and saw Gracie as a chance to combine both sides.

Boss Film Studios' Richard Edlund called the film his company's favourite after which earlier movie?

The effects budget was just under $2 million, which Edlund considered barely adequate for the amount of work required.

Carpenter knew Dennis Dun from his role in which 1985 Michael Cimino film?

Carpenter met Dun twice and cast him as Wang Chi only days before principal photography began.

A 2012 Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles episode borrowed the film's plot but renamed Lo Pan what?

'A Chinatown Ghost Story' also swapped the Storm called Rain for Wind, and James Hong returned to voice the villain.

Which company published the 1986 tie-in video game for the ZX Spectrum and Commodore 64?

Critical reception of the game was mixed, much like the film's own box-office fortunes that summer.