Escape from L A ** (1996, Kurt Russell, Cliff Robertson, Georges Corraface, A J Langer, Steve Buscemi, Stacy Keach, Bruce Campbell, Peter Fonda, Michelle Forbes, Pam Grier, Valeria Golino) – Classic Movie Review 1176

Director John Carpenter and star Kurt Russell reunite in 1996 for a fairly feeble, low-imagination, low-adrenaline sequel to 1981’s Escape from New York that plays more like a re-make. They shouldn’t have proceeded without a better script, with its obvious weary lack of invention. However, Russell still makes a very useful action hero, again playing Snake Plissken (‘Call me Snake’), and Carpenter still manages plenty of strong basic action and good kitschy action fun. 

It is set in 2013, when LA is an island after an earthquake, and Cliff Robertson is now the permanent US President, an outspoken Christian theocrat and new moral advocate who deports all dissenters to the LA island penal colony. Brainwashed by Peruvian revolutionary Georges Corraface, the President’s daughter Utopia (A J Langer) has escaped to LA with her father’s doomsday device, and the President gives Plissken slow-working poison to make him go to LA and ensure he comes back within a few hours with the device.

It co-stars Steve Buscemi, Stacy Keach, Valeria Golino, Bruce Campbell, Peter Fonda, Michelle Forbes and Pam Grier.

Russell says Snake Plissken is his favourite of the characters he’s played. Carpenter puts it down to Russell  that the film got made as ‘Snake Plissken was a character he loved and wanted to play again’. The film was first developed 1985 with a script by Coleman Luck that Carpenter called ‘too light, too campy’.

The story opens in 2000 when an earthquake hits LA, causing the San Fernando Valley to flood and turning a portion of California into an island from Malibu to Anaheim. The 1994 earthquake and the LA riots made the project relevant again, so Carpenter and Russell got together to write a new script with their long-time collaborator Debra Hill.

Escape from LA was a flop, only earning only half its $50 million budget at the box office.

© Derek Winnert 2014 Classic Movie Review 1176

Link to Derek Winnert’s home page for more film reviews: http://derekwinnert.com/