Big Trouble in Little China
A hard‑headed trucker teams up with a streetwise gambler to rescue a kidnapped bride from rival secret societies, only to discover they must survive the onslaught of three elemental warriors who control thunder, rain and lightning before the city is torn apart.
“Jack Burton's in for some serious trouble and you're in for some serious fun.”
Synopsis
Truck driver Jack Burton becomes involved in a supernatural conflict when his best friend Wang Chi's fiancée, who has green eyes, is kidnapped by henchmen of the sorcerer Lo Pan. Lo Pan needs to marry a woman with green eyes in order to return to the human realm.
Credits
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How many hands made this film
The scale of the collaboration
Principal cast & crew: 33
These are the principals we have on file — the full crew ran to the hundreds. Every film this size was made by far more hands than any credits list ever names.
Why a floor?
This is a minimum, not a total. We only count the credits we’ve captured so far, and coverage is uneven — a blockbuster might show a few hundred names while another of the same size shows a couple dozen. The real crews all ran into the thousands. The number here only grows as full credits are enriched — so we frame it as a floor, never a headcount.
Craft leads on file
Edited by Steve MirkovichShot by Dean CundeyScored by John CarpenterDesigned by John J Lloyd
Box Office
1986 · Box office
📉 Underperformed — grossed 0.4× its budget
Why 2.5×?
Cinemas keep roughly half of every ticket sold, and a wide release’s marketing often costs about as much again as the film — so a movie needs to gross around 2.5× its production budget just to break even theatrically. It’s a rule of thumb, not the studio’s ledger (home video and streaming come later).
Worldwide gross
$11.1M
US & Canada: $11.1M — 100% of worldwide · International: $3K (0%)
Opening weekend: $2.7M — 25% of its US run.
Opening week (7-day): $5.3M — 48% of its US & Canada run.
Peak 1,053 theaters
Full synopsis
Also known as
- Les Aventures de Jack Burton dans les griffes du Mandarinfr
- Grosso guaio a Chinatownit
Production & Distribution
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Cast & Crew
33 unique people credited
Top billed cast
Supporting cast
6Directors
1Writers
3Producers
3Other crew
9Parents Guide
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