Escape From New York

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Escape From New York

R

1981

1h 39m

Action

Adventure

Sci-Fi

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Tomatometer

Popcornmeter

85%

Tomatometer

72 Reviews

77%

Popcornmeter

50,000+ Ratings

In 1997, a major war between the United States and the Soviet Union is concluding, and the entire island of Manhattan has been converted into a giant maximum security prison. When Air Force One is hijacked and crashes into the island, the president is taken hostage by a group of inmates. Snake Plissken, a former Special Forces soldier turned criminal, is recruited to retrieve the president in exchange for his own freedom.

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Critics Consensus

Featuring an atmospherically grimy futuristic metropolis, Escape from New York is a strange, entertaining jumble of thrilling action and oddball weirdness.

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Anton Bitel

Little White Lies

11/19/2018

1997 is the year in which the film's events are set, but far from being a bright, progressive future, it is a hyperbolic deterioration of 1981's here and now

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Phil Hoad

Guardian

10/25/2018

4/5

The film plays its social satire broad but strings it along a rail of self-awareness.

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Arthur Knight

The Hollywood Reporter

07/10/2017

It has got an intriguing premise, an effective cast, and it has been expertly mounted.

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Eddie Harrison

film-authority.com

Apr 15

4/5

‘…John Carpenter’s still rocking 1981 action movie did an accurate job predicting a dystopian future…successfully borrows from The Omega Man and Planet of the Apes by positioning a New York where civilisation is just a memory…’

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Richard Freedman

Newark Star-Ledger

Jan 7

The film suffers from its almost unrelieved gloom.

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Alan Jones

Radio Times

09/13/2024

3/5

Despite a marvellous night-time opening sequence, this slice of escapism never really delivers on the ingenuity of its premise.

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Jason

02/08/2024

They don't make movies like these anymore. Thank you for bringing it back to the big screen.

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Joby

02/05/2024

What a great way to see a classic Carpenter/Russell collaboration. I never saw it in the theater, but this limited released allowed me to take my son to see it on the big screen. Movie still hold up today. Amazing

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S. Thomas

02/05/2024

Kurt Russell's most iconic role ever

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03Cobra

02/05/2024

An all-time classic. Never gets old. Carpenter in his prime ('76-'94).

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Mike P

@RT09890132 4d

The star here really is the story: a piece of impressively nihilistic dystopian sci-fi; and an obvious satire on crime-culture in New York...(Much like Martin Scorsese's After Hours and Charles Bronson's Death Wish)...The story has NYC being so overrun by organized crime in the near future, that eventually it's syphoned off and turned into an elaborate prison camp...Trouble comes when the president's plane crash lands in the Danger Zone, and a vigilante group led by Kurt Russell is hired to rescue him...(Similar plot to the Suicide Squad)...Lots of familiar faces in the John Carpenter stable here; Kurt Russell, Donald Pleasance, Adrienne Barbeau...Features Carpenter's crisp direction, his pleasant, colorful cinematography and his brilliantly suspenseful set pieces which he is so famous for. A pleasing sci-fi, suspense-thriller, as well as an effective if reactionary piece of 80s agitprop about crime, which holds up impressively well as a matter of fact. One of Carpenter's classics.

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Hailee G.

@MetalSiren95 6d

Definitely better in every way compared to the escape from LA.

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John Carpenter

Director

Kurt Russell

Snake Plissken

Ernest Borgnine

Cabbie

Adrienne Barbeau

Maggie

Lee Van Cleef

Bob Hauk

Donald Pleasence

President of the United States

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Escape From New York: Trailer 1

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Synopsis

In 1997, a major war between the United States and the Soviet Union is concluding, and the entire island of Manhattan has been converted into a giant maximum security prison. When Air Force One is hijacked and crashes into the island, the president is taken hostage by a group of inmates. Snake Plissken, a former Special Forces soldier turned criminal, is recruited to retrieve the president in exchange for his own freedom.

Director: John Carpenter
Producer: Larry J. Franco, Debra Hill
Screenwriter: Nick Castle, John Carpenter
Distributor: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Embassy Pictures, AVCO Embassy Pictures, MGM/UA Home Entertainment Inc.
Production Co: AVCO Embassy Pictures, Goldcrest Films International, International Film Investors
Rating: R
Genre: Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi
Original Language: English
Release Date (Theaters): Jul 10, 1981, Wide
Release Date (Streaming): May 23, 2016
Runtime: 1h 39m
Sound Mix: Surround