Escape from New York (1981)

Who payed the critics

Tells a fascinating and unsettling true story, and does so well, without pretending to have all the answers.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

This is ultimately a movie about the very bad things that can happen when we don't address our unease, when we just try to brush it off, whether that's to fit in or to preserve our self-image.

This is a classic 80's movie! Definitely worth watching if you like sci-fi movies! They don't make movies like this anymore, that's for sure... It doesn't have all those special effects and CGI nonsense. It's how movies still should be made. With actors not overacting and not all the computer generated crap. A bare bones sci-fi flick. If your looking for something different and are tired of all the crap out there check out this movie!

John Carpenter's film stars Kurt Russell as Snake Plissken, a rugged, one eyed man who is jettisoned into a thuggish New York City that's been taken over by a crime lord named the Duke (Issac Hayes) to rescue a president (Donald Pleasence) taken hostage. To say anymore would spoil the fun but certainly it is quite memorable.The film uses the tropes of many classic westerns. Carpenter (himself a huge fan of westerns) turns a futuristic New York into a land brimming with grimy, sleazy men. The legendary Snake Plissken resembles the man with no name (who was based on Kurosawa's Yojimbo). Speaking one sentence at a time, Russell plays him with so much macho elegance, it's hard not to be absorbed when he's on screen.Escape from New York is similar in ways to The Warriors, another cult classic, released two years earlier but it's the casting in Carpenters film (Hayes, Stanton, Van Cleef) that give it a certain flavor despite its minimal plot. Carpenter would direct a sequel 15 years later with Escape from L.A. which is mostly dumb and worth watching only for a couple cool sequences with Russell.9/10. Escape from New York5/10. Escape from L.A.

Painting a dismal, desolate & decaying portrait of New York City from mere scraps of filmmaking materials, John Carpenter's Escape from New York brings its brilliantly imagined dystopian future to cinematic life in a smooth & efficient manner, and is also notable for creating one of the coolest badass characters to grace the film screen.Set in the then near-future of 1997, Escape from New York shows Manhattan Island as a maximum security prison in the crime-infested United States. The plot follows Snake Plissken, an ex-soldier & convicted felon who's asked to rescue the US President & his precious cargo from the deserted land within 24 hours in exchange for full amnesty.Co-written & directed by John Carpenter (best known for Assault on Precinct 13, Halloween & The Thing), it's amazing just how authentic the dystopian environment looks despite being filmed on a shoestring budget. The premise follows a simple A to B route but it's the little details & characters that make the whole film enriching on different levels.Set pieces are wonderfully detailed. Cinematography encapsulates the picture with a dark & bleak atmosphere and manoeuvres the camera in a controlled fashion. Editing keeps the plot moving at all times although there were a couple of moments that felt necessary to the narrative. And lastly, Carpenter contributes with a fitting score that ranks amongst his finest compositions.Coming to the performances, Escape from New York packs a formidable cast in Kurt Russell & Lee Van Cleef, with Isaac Hayes, Harry Dean Stanton & others in supporting roles. Exuding a high level of badassery & coolness, Russell delivers a fantastic performance as Snake Plissken and it remains one of his most memorable roles to date. Van Cleef isn't far behind & plays his part with panache.On an overall scale, Escape from New York is a thoroughly captivating, consistently entertaining & sufficiently satisfying effort from John Carpenter and is another quality addition to his filmography. Oozing with a raw style, not devoid of substance & benefiting from Kurt Russell's strong input, it's an expertly crafted & skilfully directed dystopian sci-fi actioner that has aged well over the years, and is absolutely worthy of your time & money.

A highly entertaining sci-fi action thriller, though a bit dated. It is a Classic in the weakest sense of the term. You cannot put it in the same category as all-time classics like the Terminator, Rambo, or Alien franchises, but it is not far behind. I would put EFNY on the very cusp of being a classic.There are 3 things that make this film great. First, the star of the film is Kurt Russell as the iconic anti-hero "Snake Plissken". Russell really nails the part down as good as any iconic action figure in movie history. He delivers plenty of classic one-liners that moviegoers will quote forever. Second, the musical score by John Carpenter is fantastic. Taking a page from 1978's "Halloween", Carpenter really sets the mood of an apocalyptic NYC overrun by violent criminals. Third, the dark visual city-scape of New York created by Carpenter with abandoned buildings, dumpster fires, and maniacs roaming the streets is very well done.Now this movie is very dated looking, and does not age well. EFNY debuted in 1981, but was made in the late 1970's, and it shows. The special effects are a joke by today's standards. Watching those 70's computers with red and green signals flashing, you feel like you are in a museum. The explosions that take place in the film are laughably fake. Almost like someone lit a firecracker off and a little smoke comes out. Another trademark of this late 70's-early 80's period, is we see a prominence of big American land yacht vehicles such as Cadillac Deville's and Ford LTD's. Somehow, the dated look and primitive special effects actually lend the movie a favor. It wouldn't be the same if we had modern CGI and high def graphics.The secondary characters are mostly forgettable. Donald Pleasance as President is convincing, but is given too little screen time. Isaac Hayes as "The Duke of New York" makes for an interesting foe at first glance, but is given no memorable dialogue. The rest of the cast are used as cannon fodder. This is fine, however, because all we care about is Snake Plissken and his mission. Everyone else is expendable.What holds this movie back is they could have done so much more. By the movie's end you feel like the writers barely scratched the surface on the movie's potential. What could have been. They could have developed the secondary characters more. They could have done a more thorough story on Snake Plissken's background. Instead, the movie rushes to the action and ends rather abruptly. Still, despite its flaws, this is a great sci-fi action flick to watch on a night at home.