My Number 2 pick is going to come as a surprise to Ponty, at the very least; it’s certainly a bit of a surprise to me. It’s not because I don’t love this film—indeed, it may be my favorite film of all time—but because it’s not firmly at Number 1.
My original intent was to place John Carpenter‘s lightning-in-a-bottle classic Big Trouble in Little China (1996) in the top spot, but I realized there is a film that is objectively better (probably many such films exist, but the one I have in mind is, perhaps, the greatest film ever made, and not just because a chubby Internet personality says so).
I’m also thankful that we’ll be both be posting “Hono[u]rable Mention” (HM) pieces before we reveal our Number 1s. I am realizing that I missed quite a few classics—Ghostbusters (1984) and Blade Runner (1982), for example—and I am increasingly regretting placing Krull (1983) on the list, even at Number 7. I think it’s a great movie, but in hindsight, it should have been an HM pick.
But enough whinging. There’ll be plenty of time for that on the HM post. What about the second greatest film of all time?
Well, as that gigantic balloon reminded us, “China is here, Mr. Burton.”
Categorizing Big Trouble in Little China is difficult. Wikipedia describes it as “fantasy action-comedy film,” which gives the general idea, while not really grasping the essence of the movie. Yes, it’s a fantasy; yes, there’s plenty of action; yes, there’s lot of laughs. But the film is more than the sum of those parts.
I’m tempted to argue that BTiLC is sui generis, a film unto itself, to which nothing can compare. Indeed, I can’t think of anything to compare it to directly; even comparing it to Kung fu flicks isn’t quite right, although there is some spectacular martial arts and wire work in the movie. It seems to pull from those films while not actually being one. It has many of the tropes of Eighties action flicks, but it subverts them (and not in a lame Rian Johnson way). Any fan of the film knows will note that Jack Burton, the film’s hero (played memorably here by Kurt Russell) doesn’t really save the day—allegedly, I’ll argue!—and that this apparent sidekick Wang Chi (Dennis Dun) is the real hero.
The film opens with a brief frame scene, in which Egg Shen explains to an attorney that mystical forces were at work in the story we’re about to witness. We then cut to Jack Burton driving his big rig, The Porkchop Express, through driving rain on his way into San Francisco’s Chinatown. Jack wisecracks on his C.B. radio like a no-nonsense talk-radio DJ:
Jack wins a large sum of money from Wang Chi, whose spirit is out of alignment because his green-eyed bride-to-be is arriving at the airport that afternoon. Jack accompanies Wang to the airport so his friend doesn’t welsh on the bet, only for a gang to kidnap her. It’s here that Jack meets Gracie Law, the overly earnest white lady lawyer who enjoys meddling in the world of Chinese immigrants.
What ensues is unlike any other film: Jack and Wang end up in the middle of a bizarre, mystical street fight between two gangs (one of which is peacefully holding a funeral), complete with madmen dressed like the Boxers of 1899 mowing down innocent funeral-goers with machine guns. Suddenly, The Three Storms—Thunder, Rain, and Lightning—show up, wreaking even more havoc (and performing incredible back-flips). Jack guns it and runs over a creepily beckoning David Lo Pan:
This point is when the film turns from a typical damsel-in-distress action flick into something… totally different. Without any warning, we’ve shifted from one world to another one entirely.
As the film progresses, the characters, creatures, and settings grow more and more fantastical. Even the plot starts to get more ridiculous, as Jack attempts to infiltrate Lo Pan’s hideout as a john looking for a good time. Throughout, Jack’s very American attitude—“I don’t know what’s going on, but I don’t like it, and I’m going to fix it”—combines with Wang Chi’s Confucian calmness in humorous but subtle ways. Wang Chi usually is the one doing the difficult fighting, with Jack getting the glory.
That said, I disagree—at least in part—with the assessment that Jack Burton doesn’t do anything in this film. Sure, there’s a lot of bluster, but he does (SPOILER ALERT) catch and lethally throw the knife that kills Lo Pan. I think that theory comes from the scene in which Jack fires a machine gun in the air, shooting loose the stones from an archway, which knock him unconscious while Wang does the bulk of the fighting:
One could make the argument that there is a thread here about America charging in as the hero while our auxiliaries do the real dirty work and heavy lifting. I don’t buy it, though; I think the film is exploring the different approaches of East and West to struggle and conflict: the East is more graceful and subtle, perhaps, while the West (or America, at least) charges in, heedless of the costs or the odds.
But Big Trouble in Little China is not some allegory-writ-large—or, if it is, viewing it as such robs it of some of the magic. It’s a fish-out-of-water story, but the fish doesn’t know he’s in the wrong pond, and it makes him all the more lovable for it.
I’d be hard-pressed to identify exactly what makes this movie so great. As I noted earlier, it’s greater than the sum of its parts. Carpenter’s distinctive style gives the film that look—common in most of Carpenter’s films—that is inviting. The coloring itself makes us feel like we’re in another world.
And that’s just it—much of my love for this movie is in the feeling. It’s emotional and visceral. There are some nights—dreary, rainy ones—that make me want to bask in this movie’s fantasy world, a world that is just below the surface, if we’re hapless enough to drive our truck into an alley in Chinatown.
