"Fuck You, I'm going to Hollywood."
Director: John Carpenter
My Rating: 3.5 /5
The year is 2013 and L. A. has been separated from mainland U.S.A. by a giant earthquake. After the president declares that the island become a jail of sorts for residents of the country who have lost their citizenship, his daughter exiles herself there with a terrorist and an explosive detonation device. After a failed attempt to bring it back, the president calls in super-human Snake Plissken to retrieve his daughter and the device.
I'm mostly watching this movie to piss off my girlfriend who keeps falling asleep during movies she has picked. I've decided to make my film choices purely self satisfying from this point out.
The film has a classic Carpenter look, dark. I love it. The visual effects are perfect, cheesy and dated. Carpenter's vision of a post earthquake L.A. is pretty startling. For those who don't know, Escape from L.A. is actually a sequel. The first one, Escape from New York, didn't have as many special effects but is actually alot cooler now that I think of it. I watched it not long ago and thought it still looked really good, I like the plot more and the dialogue is way better than this one. Escape from LA isn't without it's charm however, Kurt Russell is the man as gun slinger Plissken, who has to play basketball and surf to stay alive and take down the Che Guevara-like terrorist. Steve Buscemi has never been bad in anything and this is no exception, he breathes a gentle air of comedy into a dark film. I don't actually read reviews on movies so I don't know how well this was received, but I don't think it is all that bad, it isn't great. If you enjoy the action/adventure genre, its pretty good.
