Kurt Russell Has One Requirement For A Big Trouble In Little China Remake

Word of a remake of John Carpenter's 1986 bonkers action flick "Big Trouble in Little China" came out as early as 2015. The remake was set to star Dwayne Johnson, presumably playing Jack Burton, the character previously played by Kurt Russell. Johnson reportedly wanted John Carpenter to be involved in the remake, but the director was never officially invited to anything. "I only know what I read in the papers," he said. Carpenter has been famously indifferent to other filmmakers remaking his movies, once saying that he loves it when it happens, as he gets paid for not having to do anything. Three years later, in 2018, it was announced that the new "Big Trouble" would be a sequel and not a remake, but such definitions have become hazy in a nostalgia-driven marketplace. The film's producer, Hiram Garcia, referred to the new film as a "continuation," rather than a sequel. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to. It was then that Carpenter displayed some open cynicism about the project, saying that the studio merely wanted a Johnson vehicle, and didn't really care about "Big Trouble" other than name recognition; the original film, he noted, wasn't a big hit. 

The most recent word on the remake — sorry, continuation — came in 2022 when actor James Hong, the villain in the original, said he'd be interested in returning. 

When all the news broke, Collider mentioned it to Russell, wondering what the star thought of the endeavor. Russell expressed perplexion, wondering why so many of his old movies were being remade (he had just heard about the "Overboard" remake, as well as rumors of the retreads of his old Disney work). He did feel, though, that there should at least be a palpable reason to revisit the material. Otherwise, why bother?

Russell was in a unique position to talk about the "Big Trouble in Little China" remake/continuation, as he and John Carpenter had already made 1982's "The Thing," which was a remake of Christian Nyby's 1951 thriller "The Thing from Another World." Additionally, Carpenter's film was, in turn, given a prequel-cum-remake in 2011 (which was also called "The Thing"). Russell noted that Carpenter didn't necessarily see his film as a remake of the 1951 film but as another adaptation of John W. Campbell, Jr.'s 1938 novella "Who Goes There?" on which the 1951 film was also based. Because Carpenter went back to the source material, Russell thought, it could be considered a fresh take, a new angle on the material. It also helped that the monster effects in Carpenter's "The Thing" were so impressive; the two films stand apart. 

About the original "Big Trouble," Russell noted: 

"The sensibility of that movie was very different, no movie had been made like that, and virtually you flip-flopped the leading man and the psychic. You flip-flopped those roles. That had never been done. And a lot of the humor and the style of that movie was brand new for that time and was very much copied after that, so in its way 'Big Trouble' is definitely a cult film." 

Indeed, the shtick of "Big Trouble" is that Jack Burton thinks he's the lead character when really he's the sidekick to Wang Chi, the character played by Dannis Dun. It's weird and off-kilter and gloriously strange and exciting. 

So why remake it? Russell doesn't know, but he hopes someone does. He said:

"I don't know what their reasons are for remaking the movie, but I hope that they have the right reasons. And I hope that they do it well and good luck, what can I say? I don't know, I don't have thoughts other than that. Hang in there, good luck, go get em'." 

"Big Trouble" was made for up to $25 million, but only made $11 million at the box office, defining it as a legitimate flop. Thanks to reruns on cable TV, however, and a robust home video rental market, "Big Trouble" amassed millions of new fans. It soon spun off into nostalgia-friendly products like a board game, a card game, Funko Pops, and a comic book series. It's a little surprising that "Big Trouble" hasn't been remade yet, given the industry's late '00s and '10s habit of remaking or rebooting every Gen-X-friendly property available. 

Given Johnson's waning star power (he couldn't save "Black Adam"), it's looking less and less likely that a remake of "Big Trouble in Little China" will ever be put into production. The film was weird in the first place, and it's unlikely that popular culture will ever mutate to match its oddball intensity. The only way a remake could function and succeed with a mainstream audience would be to sand off the edges, flatten it out, and make it wholly different than the original in all the ways that made it interesting. 

It's been nine years since the original announcement, and the film still hasn't been made. Only more time will tell if it will.