Escape from New York (1981)
MGM DVD (region 1)

d. John Carpenter; pr. Larry J. Franco, Debra Hill; scr. John Carpenter, Nick Castle; ph. Dean Cundey; m. John Carpenter, Alan Howarth; ed. Todd C. Ramsay; cast. Kurt Russell, Lee Van Cleef, Ernest Borgnine, Harry Dean Stanton, Donald Pleasance, Isaac Hayes, Season Hubley, Adrienne Barbeau, Tom Atkins (99 mins)

There has always been an anarchic undercurrent in the films of director John Carpenter. 

Indeed, in recent years with such works as Ghosts of Mars and Vampires he has brought this apocalyptic nihilism to the fore.  Yet his misanthropic tendencies have been a long time germinating.  Although present in such early films as Assault on Precinct 13 especially, the slyly cynical stress on despairing social collapse really found its expression in Escape from New York, perhaps the reference point for future Carpenter films even more so than his breakthrough hit Halloween.  Indeed, Carpenter would always express his fondness for the film and its lead character (still his most remarkable anti-hero) and would eventually return to make a sequel, Escape from LA, which in turn convinced many critics that he had finally fully emerged from what was considered something of a directorial slump through the latter half of the 1980s.  The original Escape from New York was Carpenter’s biggest budget film to that date, granted him by a studio in awe of Halloween’s spectacular box-office performance, and it allowed him to indulge in a science-fiction adventure that is part episodic jeremiad and part subversive celebration of the rebellious anarchy that the director finds most ambiguously fascinating about human nature.  It also gave former Disney child star Kurt Russell his one great anti-hero alter-ego.

Escape from New York is set in 1997.  In the preceding fifteen years, the crime rate in the USA has exploded out of all control and the city of Manhattan has now become the one maximum security prison for the entire country. 

Prisoners of all kinds (and both genders) are dumped there, in the midst of a chaotic, anarchic humanity with nevertheless its own developing social structures.  One night a plane flies over restricted airspace.  The plane is identified as Air-force One.  It has been seized by terrorists who intend to crash it (in the name of all the oppressed workers of the Imperialist state) into the city.  The plane goes down, but the President (Donald Pleasence) is apparently alive and now being held captive by the New Yorkers, led by the self-appointed Duke of New York (Isaac Hayes).  The prison security chief (Lee Van Cleef) has a problem – if he sends in a rescue team, the President will be killed; but if the President is not rescued in time to play a pre-recorded tape at an historic summit meeting, the world will be plunged into war.  In twenty four hours, the President will no longer be as needed as he is now.  Van Cleef tries one last solution, to send in a captured prisoner awaiting transportation, noted criminal Snake Plissken (Kurt Russell).  Russell is injected with microscopic shells dissolving in his bloodstream before being sent in.  He has 24 hours to find the President or these shells will explode.

Russell plays an anti-hero with the fate of the world at his disposal.  How he ultimately handles it is a measure of Carpenter’s marvelous, but bleakly comical cynicism. 

Indeed, Carpenter’s depiction of a metaphysically fallen New York City is full of sly nihilism as he absolutely revels in the anarchic world he creates.  The drive for survival and power has eclipsed all morality in this irredeemable future.  The only alternative to this world of prisoners is the stiff authority of their jailers, men who have ironically (but perhaps understandably) lost all respect for human rights.  Such American authority inspires only the defiant, cathartic possibility of anarchy and revolution.  That this is almost a welcome alternative makes the film decidedly subversive in spirit if not intention.  The world depicted is abhorrent, full of the madness and despair that comes with the freedom from social constraint.  It is this subject that interests Carpenter – the continuation of “society” in the absence of a functioning social compact, the world of futuristic social Darwinism.  Although arguably a comic book world, it is one that is full of energy, chaos and despair and as such makes for an ideal speculation on contemporary fears of an urban wasteland, as stylized as that depicted in another anarchic New York fantasy, Walter Hill’s 1979 film of The Warriors.  Indeed, both films seek to depict a kind of mythic journey through society in breakdown.

Yet what Carpenter stresses throughout is the notion of Russell’s journey as his final reckoning with the rules and standards of order.

His struggle for survival is personal rather than ideological although his final gesture is full of subversive, anarchic symbolism.  The film is finally a vital, vicious modern myth, the triumph of the anti-hero in a world where all rules need to be torn down whatever the cost – a theme that would dominate Carpenter’s work in the 1990s.  It is a vindication of defiance and rebellion as almost precipitating revolution (the core theme to inform the sequel, Escape from LA).  Even the noble President can be reduced to a vengeful and petty killer when humiliated.  Order and anarchy clash as humanity itself collapses and amoral loners are ironically charged with the responsibility for the maintenance of so-called civilization: this is the burden of the anti-hero and his reaction is a measure of his innate need to destroy what others take as essential.  Few films have weighed up the clash between civilization and anarchy with such celebratory cynicism.  It is almost punkish in its exhilarating vision of social collapse: anarchy as entertainment, full of the knowing wit one expects from such self-conscious a use of Hollywood artifice.  That the film endures as well as it does is a testament to a director not without flaws but with an invigoratingly subversive take on American genre filmmaking.

DVD DETAILS:

Vision
The 16:9 enhanced widescreen visual transfer is not without minor clarity problems although settles down to amount to a superior transfer.  At times murky and indistinct, it nevertheless demonstrates the director’s justifiably much-praised mastery of widescreen composition.  With much of the film taking place at night, the blacks and shadows are engagingly deep and clear, the unusual but particularly dark and dingy pop-art colors and ravaged city look is effective as a glimpse into an anarchic New York free from any social or legal constraint.  It is full of bizarre costumes and characters and an amusing incorporation of New York City landmarks, all done with a vibrant comic-book use of camera angles and colors for an almost apocalyptic feel.  Indeed, as mentioned, the one-night premise and deliberate comic-book stylization recalls Walter Hill’s The Warriors.  Shots of a glider making its way through the dark canyons of the city are most effective and there is a striking use of firelight amidst the somber textures.  Also intriguing is the way in which Russell loses his equipment and then regains it as a measure of his resilience.  There is a fine sense of open and closed spaces in Russell’s journey and an emphasis on motion, as if to stay still is a sure sign of stagnation and defeat.  As befitting a film so episodic in structure, there are several set-pieces of most unusual spectacle.

Sound
The sound transfer is engrossing in a bare but effective Dolby Digital stereo surround, with the occasional suspenseful directional effect keeping things effectively unsettling and suspenseful.  The surround mix nicely enhances Carpenter’s original score (one of his most memorable) and there are fine spatial effects, with voices and off-screen sounds giving an unnerving sense of the threats contained within this distinctive urban wasteland.  Voices are always resonant, with the depth of a well-cast Isaac Hayes being particularly effective.  The soft whirr of helicopters and the odd customized cars adds some unusual aural texture and the journey through the city is full of unusual sounds all crisply transferred and amounting to a convincing depiction of the disintegration of society and in turn, humanity itself – thus there is much stress on the animalism of many of these people when freed from convention.  The use of source music is always amusing and there is a fine moment of musical-theatre parody as Russell wanders through a theatre.  There is both humor and suspense in this offbeat mix of the abrupt and the oddly soft and smooth: as a technical display of an anarchic world, this mix and transfer is most convincing, even if it lacks the fullness of detail that remastering may make possible.  Still, as a record of an outstanding cult film entertainment, this is most worthwhile.

Special Features

The only special feature on this single disc edition is a theatrical trailer.  This is most disappointing considering that a previous laserdisc edition reportedly contained some deleted scenes expanding upon Russell’s previous in-character exploits.  As John Carpenter is one of the most prominent of American cult directors, Escape from New York is one film that truly deserves a special edition.  Indeed, in the time since reviewing the single disc release, a 2 disc Special Edition has been released in region 1 and 4, including a commentary track and the afore-mentioned deleted scene.  In region 4 though, a single disc special edition has also now been released.