STARRING: Kurt Russell,
Stacy Keach, Steve Buscemi, Peter Fonda, Georges Corraface, Cliff Robertson
1996, 101 Minutes, Directed
by John Carpenter
Description:Kurt Russell reprises his role as Snake Plissken, of the near-future
thriller Escape from New York, in this reworking of that film's basic
premise. Instead of New York being a maximum-security prison, this time it's
L.A., which through the agency of earthquakes has become an island of the
damned. This penal colony is where the film's future rulers, something very
like the Moral Majority, send those deemed guilty of "moral crimes." But
something has gone wrong in this new moral order, because the President's
daughter has absconded to L.A. with a detonation device, and Snake is
commandeered to retrieve it. —
Amazon.com
I must admit to enjoying
this movie more than I should have: it really is a bad movie. But it is also a fun
movie as Kurt Russell re-does his Snake Plisken role (basically a Hell's Angel meets Dirty
Harry) and is sent off on a dangerous mission in Los Angeles which, after a giant
earthquake, is an island separated from mainland America. It has been turned into a
high-tech prison into which social outcasts and criminals are unceremoniously dumped by
the new Christian right-wing government.
Less serious than its
predecessor, it is basically a re-make of Escape from New York.
(Can you believe it that that movie is now almost sixteen years old!)
Not exactly the
movie that would rescue John (Halloween, Dark Star)
Carpenter's sagging career, but it makes for an entertaining Saturday matinee show
nonetheless. Whatever you do, don't miss the last ten minutes of this movie. Enuff sed!
Sci-Fi Movie Page Pick:Snake Plisken is back! More of a remake of, than a sequel to, director John Carpenter's 1981 cult Escape from New York hit. With its tongue firmly in its cheek, of
course . . .Great fun!
Description:
Kurt Russell reprises his role as Snake Plissken, of the near-future
thriller Escape from New York, in this reworking of that film's basic
premise. Instead of New York being a maximum-security prison, this time it's
L.A., which through the agency of earthquakes has become an island of the
damned. This penal colony is where the film's future rulers, something very
like the Moral Majority, send those deemed guilty of "moral crimes." But
something has gone wrong in this new moral order, because the President's
daughter has absconded to L.A. with a detonation device, and Snake is
commandeered to retrieve it. —