At this particular moment the gangs are all blasting their firearms into the air, something generally reserved for New Year's Eve in LA. The Happy Kingdom sequence is part of the finale. In the world of Snake Plissken (actor Kurt Russell), the lead character in "Escape from New York" who now finds himself having to "Escape from LA", the "so-called" forces of good - the police and government - are sometimes indistinguishable in their methods from the forces of evil.įor "Escape from LA", Carpenter re-teamed with Russell and producer Debra Hill. It's the forces of good who are continually at war with one another over what to do next. Since his 1976 film, "Assault on Precinct 13", the forces of evil have stood united. In director John Carpenter's world, this should come as no surprise. The town square, lit eerily by torches and oil drum fires, is covered with graffiti, broken windows and some 400 extras costumed as all manner of anti-social types, from bikers to gangstas. But it could be standing in for Disneyland's Magic Kingdom gone to hell in the year 2013.Ī gigantic earthquake has turned Los Angeles and environs into an island. Technically, production notes call it the "Happy Kingdom" sequence. The Back to the Future town square on the Universal Studios lot is serving as a different place in a different kind of future. But the tape ends during it, so I won’t watch it.It's nine o'clock on a February evening. ![]() It would have been nice to see a story that was different to the first film, though.Īfter this, recording continues, and there’s quite a bit of another movie, Mulholland Falls. This was a bit of a mess, frankly, but Kurt Russell is still ridiculously cool, so I can forgive a lot. The President orders Snake killed, but it’s not him, it’s a hologram (nicely established right at the start of the film when Keach and Forbes use them). The president really hates his daughter, and has her strapped into an electric chair as he prepares to make a worldwide broadcast. This is the most time sensitive toxin ever devised. Now they’re flying hang gliders – Carpenter really is throwing everything at this, isn’t he? Pam Grier plays Hershe Las Palmas, someone Snake knew from before. Snake meets Peter Fonda again, and after an Earthquake, they surf a Tsunami. Then Jones makes Snake play Basketball, which he’s surprisingly good at for a man with one eye. Snake is captured again, this time by Cuervo Jones, who has got control of an EMP satellite that can shut down all electrical devices anywhere in the world. But she is fairly quickly killed by a random shooter, so that Snake gets more motivation. ![]() Valeria Golino plays Taslima, who is captured with Snake by the Surgeon General, and they escape together. Steve Buscemi plays Map To The Stars Eddie.īruce Campbell plays the Surgeon General of Beverly Hills. There’s a fairly starry cast when he gets to LA too, starting with Peter Fonda. Instead of a glider, this time he gets to the island in a nuclear powered submarine. It’s nice to see that 16 years hasn’t improved the technology for wrist-based death counters. Instead of micro explosives, this time Snake is injected with a deadly virus that will kill him in a few hours, but won’t have any noticeable physical effects for several hours. George Corraface plays Cuervo Jones, a Che Guevara cosplayer turned revolutionary, and he’s who the daughter went to LA to join up with. Lee Van Cleef was dead, so in his place is Stacy Keach, who tells Snake that he has to get the Macguffin back, but he can kill the daughter. The President’s Daughter absconded from Air Force One, with a very important piece of technology, landed in LA, and the President wants it back. It’s now 2013 and Snake Plissken has been arrested again, and taken to LA.īut there’s a reason they arrested him. This almost feels like a remake, as it follows the plot of the original rather closely. An Earthquake does hit in 2000, separating LA from the continental US, and the US government, now led by President for Life Robertson, now banishes all those found guilty of ‘moral crimes’ to the island of LA. This was science fiction in 1996 when this film was made. It opens, as did the original, setting up the premise – that in 1998, Los Angeles are so wracked with ‘crime and immorality’ that ‘The United States Police Force’ was set up by a President (Cliff Robertson) who believes a huge Earthquake will wipe out LA in divine retribution. ![]() A sequel to John Carpenter’s classic SF movie, and one that, perhaps, we were unwise to wish for,
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