Outtakes Online: Going Gangnam in ‘Little China’

Wesley Freitas dances in his video parody 'Lo Pan Style.' (Courtesy photo)

BY MIKE GORDON / mgordon@staradvertiser.com

In your mind, you probably never pictured Psy’s “Gangnam Style” rap and John Carpenter’s cult classic “Big Trouble in Little China” sharing a cinematic moment, but Wesley Freitas has.

Freitas, the Maui-born actor who created last summer’s viral video “Batman Maybe,” just released a follow-up parody he calls “Lo Pan Style.”

James Hong appeared in the original 'Big Trouble in Little China' and in 'Lo Pan Style.' (Courtesy photo)

It’s a wild send-up named for the original movie’s evil character, played by James Hong, whom Freitas actually convinced to dance in “Lo Pan Style.”

The 30-year-old Freitas wrote the lyrics, produced and directed the video and stars as both the ancient and young version of Lo Pan. That’s him under the 2,000-year-old wrinkles and that’s him again, sashaying past the entrance to L.A.’s Chinatown dressed in a black robe and wearing sunglasses, a fake beard and long fingernails.

Freitas has been a big fan of “Big Trouble in Little China” since he was in high school. He has seen it so often — sometimes at midnight screenings with die-hard fans — that he can quote almost any part of the movie, he said.

“It was one of those movies that when you watch as a kid you don’t know what is happening but you like it and you revisit it,” Freitas said. “This is one of the few movies form childhood that is better than I remembered. It grows on you.”

It looks like “Lo Pan Style” is growing on people as well. It launched Sunday and already has more than 252,000 views.
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Mike Gordon covers film and television in Hawaii for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser. Email him at mgordon@staradvertiser.com and follow him on Twitter. Read his weekly “Outtakes” column Sundays in the Star-Advertiser.

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