![]() The twisted world of post-prison Los Angeles that Snake finds himself in is a circus of exaggerated cultures that Escape from New York had only been able to hint at. If that were the extent of the film’s satirical bent, it would rub me the wrong way, but the movie goes far beyond that opening and targets seemingly everyone. He’s a fervently Christian man who has set up a theocracy in America with morality laws that determine people’s behavior with the lawbreakers being exiled to Los Angeles (or executed if they so choose). The president is modeled after John Carpenter’s perception of Jerry Falwell, and he’s president for life after predicting that earthquake that cut off Los Angeles from the mainland and a new constitutional amendment. It can be directed or generalized, and with threats of invasion from South and Central American countries, the president (Cliff Robertson) is determined to get it back. She stole a weapon from a government lab (somehow, I’m okay with this) that has the power to destroy electronic capability through satellites in orbit. Langer) lost in the citywide prison of Los Angeles. The variations on this story from the earlier film is that it’s not the president himself lost in the citywide prison of New York, it is the president’s daughter, Utopia (A.J. is a work bred from hatred of a lot of things, and it is the nadir (one might say zenith) of his nihilism and cynicism, and that, once again, is centered on Kurt Russell’s Snake Plissken. Carpenter also hated Jerry Falwell, faux-revolutionaries, and pretty much all of modernity. By 1996, presented with $50 million to make a sequel to his cult hit from the 80s about a Clint Eastwood impersonation breaking into and out of jail, Carpenter seemed to decide to just burn all of his bridges at once, making a deeply cynical satire of all of Hollywood. By the late 80s, he seemed to give up on the studio system with a pair of independently financed films (an experience that lead to lawsuits with the independent company), and Carpenter returned to trying to work within the studio system in the early 90s. He worked his butt off for decades trying to make Hollywood happy with him so that he could raise money to make movies he wanted to make. John Carpenter has dealt with a lot of crap from Hollywood. does more with the plot points in far more interesting ways. There’s even a moment where Snake is put into an impossible to survive gladiatorial gauntlet that he ends up not only surviving but getting the audience to cheer him on.īut, much like how I prefer Only Angels Have Wings to Ceiling Zero, I feel like Escape from L.A. Snake Plissken is brought to infiltrate a city-sized prison of crazy sub-cultures in order to rescue a piece of technology held by a resident of the White House, setting up a conflict with the local warlord, meeting up with friends he lost along the way, and ultimately getting off the island to come face to face with the true nature of presidential leadership. ![]() Yes, Escape from L.A.is a beat for beat remake of Escape from New York. Well, I feel like the script for Escape from L.A. In my review for the first cinematic adventure of Snake Plissken I wrote that it was hampered by extreme budgetary constraints and some odd structural issues with its narrative, insisting that it really needed a script polish before shooting at the very least. I think this is one of John Carpenter’s best films, and I think it’s a large step up from Escape from New York. I unabashedly, unironically, and unashamedly love this movie. ![]() #2 in my ranking of John Carpenter’s films.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |