Big Trouble in Little China

Big Trouble in Little China is a far more enjoyable mash-up of classic Westerns, Saturday-morning serials, and Chinese wu xia than any of the Indiana Jones movies, with Kurt Russell in full bloom as Carpenter’s de rigueur hard-drinkin’, hard-gamblin’, wise-crackin’ loner hero—a bowling-alley John Wayne. Read full review

There are two kinds of people: the ones who have seen — and love — Big Trouble in Little China, a John Carpenter kung fu Western buddy Chinese ghost love story, and those poor saps who aren’t burdened with having to try and describe it to the uninitiated. Read full review

What matters is the stunts and the spirit, and this latest set of exotic exploits of an indomitable hero (Kurt Russell) and a spunky heroine (Kim Cattrall) gives good value. Read full review

Big Trouble is plenty conscious of its silliness, which it embraces fully. It sets up its own parameters of ridiculousness and then runs with them, winking a little, but sticking to its story. Read full review

It falters a little in its confusing climactic battle, but is breathlessly paced, wittily scripted, amusingly played, action-packed and relentlessly spooky. Read full review

Carpenter has always been a skilful genre mechanic, breathing life into old forms; if he stubs his toes up against the bamboo curtain this time, there is still more enjoyable sly humour than in most slug-fests. Read full review

Written and directed in a campy, tongue-in-cheek style, it's a loving homage to those wild imports from Hong Kong--kung-fu movies. Read full review

The first 30 minutes of the movie gave me lots of room for hope. It was fast-moving, it was visually spectacular, it was exotic and lighthearted and filled with a spirit of adventure. But then, gradually, the movie began to recycle itself. It began to feel as if I was seeing the same thing more than once. Read full review

The big trouble with John Carpenter's Big Trouble in Little China is its tone. This time out, the director of Halloween and Starman has concocted a cartoon with human characters -- or, as it is described in the movie's press materials, a mystical action-adventure comedy-kung-fu monster-ghost story. Any film that needs that many adjectives to explain itself is already in trouble. [03 July 1986, p.D9]

Tthough it is action packed, spectacularly edited and often quite funny, one can't help feeling that Carpenter is squeezing the last drops out of a fatigued genre. Ten years ago this would have been one wild and crazy movie; in this era of ruthlessly efficient entertainments, it's a rather one-note evening. [14 July 1986, p.69]

At his best, Carpenter was able to do amazing things with low budgets and a surfeit of creativity but, despite the arguments of its adherents, Big Trouble in Little China isn’t an example of one of those instances. Read full review

Director John Carpenter seems to be trying to make an action-adventure along the lines of Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. The effect goes horribly awry. Read full review

Big Trouble in Little China is a try at mock-Oriental movie magic that goes leaden about a third of the way through -- and finally detonates into great, whomping firebombs of overcalculated, underinspired absurdity. [02 July 1986, p.10]

THERE'S Big Trouble in Little China all right, as Kurt Russell wrestles his way through this kung-fu comedy adventure. It might have been a Raiders of the Lost Wok, but instead it's a bad marriage of martial arts and action spoofery, bungled by director John Carpenter working from the world's worst screenplay. [04 July 1986, p.N29]

Though the film does contain a few minutes of patented Carpenter camera magic, it is unable to sustain either story or character. For all its flash and color, it is a dull film--an artless dig in the Spielberg garden. [02 July 1986, p.C3]