Escape from New York

John Carpenter’s “Escape from New York” images the entire metropolis as a maximum security prison, where dangerous criminals and political dissidents are sent to serve out life sentences with no chance of parole. Carpenter’s dystopic vision populates the crumbling city with subway dwelling nomads and marauding gangs that rule the streets with chaos and destruction. When the President of the United States (Donald Pleasence) crashes his plane into the prison area, condemned criminal and one time war hero Snake Plissken (played with laconic glee by Kurt Russell), is sent in to rescue him from the highly dangerous fortress. Carpenter’s cult hit is a subversive and satirical take on a New York which was at the time (it was made in 1982), riddled with crime and corruption. The film also takes swipes at right wing paranoia by offering an alarming vision of how the average American would really like to solve escalating crime. Cast includes Isaac Hayes, Harry Dean Stanton, Ernest Borgnine, Lee Van Cleef and Adrienne Barbeau.