Big Trouble In Little China
Aug. 13th, 2010 08:03 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
seriousficI'd like to follow my own advice and be positive for a minute. Now, you've probably heard of Big Trouble In Little China. It's a movie done by John Carpenter and Kurt Russell when both were at the top of their game, and if it weren't as good as it is, you probably wouldn't even know about it. But it's an endlessly entertaining and hilarious adventure movie, packed with the kind of badass latex special effects you got before everyone used CGI for everything. So no question as to quality. What maybe you haven't heard is that it's also kick-ass from a racial perspective.
So Kurt Russell plays Jack Burton, a long-haul trucker who's one part John Wayne and two parts Indiana Jones... although unfortunately for him, maybe not the best parts. He's in Chinatown, playing poker with his old friend Wang when he gets roped into taking Wang to pick up his fiance at the airport. From there, he pretty much becomes the spice in an awesome homage to chop-socky movies.
I know what you're thinking. Jack turns out to be the Chosen One, destined to save all the hapless Oriental folks, and after being trained by a wizened old man who speaks in Zen koans, he turns out to be the best martial artist ever. He kills the bad guy, saves the world, and picks up a hot Asian babe for his trouble.
"This looks like a bit much for me and Jackie. Whitey, you'd better handle it."
Well... no. Not at all. Jack is, from the get-go and all the way through to the end, in over his head and as likely to screw the pooch as he is to save the day. As is obvious both from watching the movie and listening to the creators, while the story is told from Jack's perspective (since he's the one who gets all the craziness explained to him rather than knowing it from the get-go), Wang is the Big Damn Hero. The story is basically Star Wars as told by Han Solo. Jack helps out some, but he's a side character in Wang's narrative. In fact, you might say he's the wacky ethnic comic relief.
There's been a lot of talk about cultural appropriation on LJ, but there's none of that here. The villains are Chinese, the heroes are Chinese, and the story is entirely focused on Chinese magic. And they're all played by Chinese actors. These aren't stereotypes either. The great Victor Wong plays his old mystic as a good-natured trickster full of joie de vie and smiles. James Hong plays his baddie as more cantankerous old man than Fu Manchu. And so on and so forth. Asians who aren't sexless kung-fu masters or pervy computer nerds? Y RLY!
Sorry, maybe you can be in some other classic 80s movie?
So if you're in the mood for a great movie that's also very racially progressive, I'd recommend Big Trouble In Little China: It's got Kurt fucking Russell in it.
So Kurt Russell plays Jack Burton, a long-haul trucker who's one part John Wayne and two parts Indiana Jones... although unfortunately for him, maybe not the best parts. He's in Chinatown, playing poker with his old friend Wang when he gets roped into taking Wang to pick up his fiance at the airport. From there, he pretty much becomes the spice in an awesome homage to chop-socky movies.
I know what you're thinking. Jack turns out to be the Chosen One, destined to save all the hapless Oriental folks, and after being trained by a wizened old man who speaks in Zen koans, he turns out to be the best martial artist ever. He kills the bad guy, saves the world, and picks up a hot Asian babe for his trouble.
"This looks like a bit much for me and Jackie. Whitey, you'd better handle it."
Well... no. Not at all. Jack is, from the get-go and all the way through to the end, in over his head and as likely to screw the pooch as he is to save the day. As is obvious both from watching the movie and listening to the creators, while the story is told from Jack's perspective (since he's the one who gets all the craziness explained to him rather than knowing it from the get-go), Wang is the Big Damn Hero. The story is basically Star Wars as told by Han Solo. Jack helps out some, but he's a side character in Wang's narrative. In fact, you might say he's the wacky ethnic comic relief.
There's been a lot of talk about cultural appropriation on LJ, but there's none of that here. The villains are Chinese, the heroes are Chinese, and the story is entirely focused on Chinese magic. And they're all played by Chinese actors. These aren't stereotypes either. The great Victor Wong plays his old mystic as a good-natured trickster full of joie de vie and smiles. James Hong plays his baddie as more cantankerous old man than Fu Manchu. And so on and so forth. Asians who aren't sexless kung-fu masters or pervy computer nerds? Y RLY!
Sorry, maybe you can be in some other classic 80s movie?
So if you're in the mood for a great movie that's also very racially progressive, I'd recommend Big Trouble In Little China: It's got Kurt fucking Russell in it.
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no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 02:09 am (UTC)"It's time for the medicine."
"What's this do again?"
"It lets you see things no one else can see, do things no one else can do."
"REAL thing?"
"As real as [The Villain]"
"I'll drink to that!"
Villain: "You were not put on this earth to 'get it', Mr. Burton!"
no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 02:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 03:38 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-08-14 03:55 am (UTC)Who's Kurt, who's Russell, and why should I care?
*rimshot*