ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK (1981)

 

PHENOMENALITY: *marvelous*
MYTHICITY: *fair,*
FRYEAN MYTHOS: *adventure*
CAMPBELLIAN FUNCTIONS: *sociological*

Though I enjoyed my re-watch of ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK, it's not one of John Carpenter's most kinetic films. Carpenter got to make the film on the strength of HALLOWEEN's box office, but ESCAPE's pace is less like HALLOWEEN, or the later BIG TROUBLE IN LITTLE CHINA, and more like its immediate predecessor THE FOG: brooding with malevolence.

ESCAPE may be also be seen as a negative response to the many sunny space operas spawned by STAR WARS-- though the original Lucas film had its moments of grit and grime-- and a return to the subgenre that dominated big-budget SF-films in the late 1960s and early 1970s: the dystopia-subgenre represented by the PLANET OF THE APES films, SOYLENT GREEN, and SILENT RUNNING.  Like SOYLENT GREEN, ESCAPE trades freely on the image of New York as the ultimate "urban jungle." Here Carpenter and co-scripter Nick Castle extrapolate from the city's 1970s reputation as "Crime City" to imagine a scenario in which the American government has surrendered Manhattan Island to the criminal element, turning it into the country's biggest penitentiary.  Criminals are allowed to make their own society, as long as they don't try to leave.

An aerial mishap drops the President of the U.S. into Manhattan, along with an audiotape he carries, containing a speech vital to keeping the peace with the country's perennial enemies, China and the USSR. One of the prison's alpha-dogs, "the Duke of New York"(Isaac Hayes), takes the President prisoner and threatens to kill him if the country doesn't yield to the prisoners' demands-- which, naturally, include freedom.  The authorities draft ex-special forces commando Snake Plissken to covertly enter the city and escape with both the President and the tape he carries. Just to keep it clear that the authorities are not the good guys, their representative Hauk (Lee Van Cleef) injects Plissken with timed explosives that will eventually kill him, if he doesn't return on time with both of his acquisitions.

The film then follows Plissken on his dystopian search-and-rescue mission, as he infiltrates Manhattan, makes a few semi-trustworthy allies (including the director's wife Adrienne Barbeau), and eventually succeeds in freeing the President-- albeit with a twist that visits a fitting revenge on the corrupt authorities of America. (No final face-off between Russell and Van Cleef, unfortunately.)

Russell, principally known in the U.S. for his light Disney comedies, successfully re-created his image as the super-tough Snake, despite the fact that ESCAPE's body count seems rather low for this type of thriller. And though the actor did pump up his bod to do so, his scathing, cynical attitude is what sells the film-- which is fortunate, because Carpenter and Castle don't give any other character much presence. Hayes' "Duke" and Barbeau's "Maggie" look good, but they don't have any good character-arcs. ESCAPE is Russell's film all the way.