Time for a new weekly segment here at PunchDrunkCritics. Every week I'm going to write about a movie that is not quite what you would call critically acclaimed, but still you love it. Guilty pleasures, whatever you want to call them we all have them and I really think they define what movies were originally meant for...Pure entertainment. Anyone who's listened to the podcast may have noticed that I'm not really you're typical critic. I find my movie time better spent with ridiculous fun that with introspective drama, not that I don't also enjoy the latter it's just that I like having fun alot more. This weeks edition....
Big Trouble in Little China
Ahh, the story of Jack Burton's trip to Chinatown. Here's a brief rundown of the plot. Jack Burton is a truck driver visiting his friend Wang in San Francisco's Chinatown. He goes with Wang to pick up Wang's girlfriend from the airport, there she is abducted by thugs who work for the underworld kingpin/sorcerer Lo Pan. She's abducted because she has green eyes which is very rare and Lo Pan needs a green eyed sacrafice to break a curse on him and become human again.
Man is this a fun movie, it's got everything you could want, awesome martial arts, sorcery, gunplay, pretty girls, monsters, rapid fire witty dialouge, the list goes on and on. Kurt Russell plays really for me one of his most memorable roles this side of Snake Plisken in Jack Burton, and the wonderful Victor Wong plays Egg Shen the good sorcerer/oldman/teacher type. The best part of the movie for me however were the elemental warriors and protectors of Lo Pan, Thunder, Rain, and Lighting. Apparently the makers of Mortal Kombat liked this flick too because Raiden from the MK series is basically an exact copy of the Lightning character. These guys were just bad ass showing up from no where and kicking ass with that cold cool look that only the Terminator himself had pulled off previously. From that trio also results one of the coolest deaths in any action movie I've seen, when Jack is facing off against Thunder and causes his head to inflate and explode. Whew, I could write about his movie for hours but I'll cut it off here before I start to ramble, long story short if you haven't seen this flick yet and you're looking for some mindless fun...throw this one in your Netflix queue, and remember what ole Jack Burton always says,
"When some wild-eyed, eight-foot-tall maniac grabs your neck, taps the back of your favorite head up against the barroom wall, looks you crooked in the eye and asks you if ya paid your dues, you just stare that big sucker right back in the eye, and you remember what ol' Jack Burton always says at a time like that: "Have ya paid your dues, Jack?" "Yessir, the check is in the mail."
