Product Details

• Actors: Kurt Russell, Steve Buscemi, Stacy Keach, Peter Fonda, Cliff Robertson
• Directors: John Carpenter
• Writers: Kurt Russell, John Carpenter, Debra Hill, Nick Castle
• Producers: Kurt Russell, Debra Hill
• Format: AC-3, Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, Letterboxed, NTSC, Widescreen
• Language: English (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround), English (Dolby Digital 5.1), French (Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround)
• Subtitles: Spanish
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 2.35:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: R (Restricted)
• Studio: Paramount
• DVD Release Date: December 15, 1998
• Run Time: 101 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (136 customer reviews)
• ASIN: 6305222886
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #59,875 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)
• Learn more about "Escape from L.A." on IMDb

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Kurt Russell reprises his role as Snake Plissken, of the near-future thriller Escape from New York, in this reworking of that film's basic premise. Instead of New York being a maximum-security prison, this time it's L.A., which through the agency of earthquakes has become an island of the damned. This penal colony is where the film's future rulers, something very like the Moral Majority, send those deemed guilty of "moral crimes." But something has gone wrong in this new moral order, because the President's daughter has absconded to L.A. with a detonation device, and Snake is commandeered to retrieve it. The film's dark dystopia, with its satrical elements taking aim at our dwindling freedoms, and the eclipsing of democracy by narrow interests, are more the subject this time. As a result the action suffers, and the plot devices are sometimes weak and predictable. But just below the surface there is a coiled Snake ready to strike. Steve Buscemi's performance as a weasely hawker of L.A. tour maps is a standout, and the presence of Peter Fonda and Pam Grier adds to the fun. In fact, just the sight of Fonda surfing down the flooded corridor of Sunset Boulevard is reason enough to check this movie out. --Jim Gay

Product Description

Kurt Russell, Steve Buscemi. Cold-blooded mercenary Snake Plissken gets forced into another suicide mission, this time to deactivate a doomsday device and rescue the President's daughter, hidden deep inside the rubble and chaos of 2013 Los Angeles. 1996/color/101 min/R/widescreen.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

37 of 42 people found the following review helpful

4.0 out of 5 stars A Joke? May 7, 2004

By Stanley Runk VINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

When I first saw this film in the theaters, I really didn't like it. In fact, I was pretty let down! I had grown up with Escape From New York, and to my horror, John Carpenter remade his own film! I'm not kidding, REMADE it. Right down to Snake getting shot in the leg and limping for the last half of the film. Years later I revaluated my opinion. You can't make a film as corny as this on accident, especially if you're a veteran director like John Carpenter; It had to be done on purpose. I've read numerous interviews over the years and have found out two things, and I think these two things are the reason this film ended up the way it did. First, John Carpenter hates sequels. He never wanted to make sequels to his films. He never wanted a sequel to Halloween(let alone six! That's why he produced Halloween 3 which people hated so much, coz he was trying to take this series in a different direction and not retread the whole Michael Myers thing). I also understand that both Carpenter and Kurt Russell were under alot of studio pressure to make this film. I don't know what kind of favor Carpenter owed the studio, but he made this film. And my theory is that he made this film intentionally bad to say to the studio, "There, I made the stinking sequel you wanted, don't ask me to do it again!" I mean really, if he had wanted to make a sequel to Escape From New York, don't you think he would have struck while the iron was hot and made it at the height of the first film's success instead of waiting 15 years? Think about it. When I consider this scenario, I can watch Escape From L.A and have a good laugh thinking that John Carpenter may have played a big joke on the Hollywood studios. Really, there's no way Carpenter included that surfing scene with the intention of it being taken seriously. The film is just way too overblown, way too cheesy and obviously a carbon copy of the original to be anything other than a joke. Kurt may be older now, but he's actually still able to play Snake Plissken like it's 1980. The performance is great, it's just the film surrounding Kurt that's silly. Try watching it again and see what you think.

30 of 35 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Under appreciated minor classic almost a remake February 20, 2005

By Wayne Klein HALL OF FAMETOP 100 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:DVD

Sequels used to be about remaking the same film again and again (remember "Friday The 13th" or "Nightmare on Elm Street"?)with minor variations so the audience gets their fix. John Carpenter, Kurt Russell and Debra Hill inverted the paradigmn reprising the best elements from "Escape from New York" while introducing a heavy dose of satire aimed squarely at the Moral Majority and groups of that nature. While not as memorable as that film, "Escape from L. A." takes perfect aim at liberal Hollywood, the conservative religious right, sequels and skewers them all dead on most of the time.

Snake Plissken is back in trouble. Captured again he's put into the service of national security against his will. It seems a device that can detonate orbital nuclear devices has been stolen by the President's daughter and delivered into the hands of a self styled rebel leader named Cuervo Jones (George Corraface)in what's left of Southern California. Cuervo plans on using this device against the United States. Plissken is sent to the island of Los Angeles to retreive the device. Yes, folks the BIG ONE finally hit and a large part of the Los Angeles basin dropped into the ocean like a ten ton weight while the remainder floats off the coast of the United States making the perfect place to deport people who don't have high moral fiber or generally tick off the President for life (Cliff Robertson in a twisted performance). Infected by a deadly designer virus that makes Ebola seem like the flu, Snake has no choice but to take the job of retrieving. Malloy (Stacy Keach stepping in for the late Lee Van Cleef)and Brazen (the beautiful Michelle Forbes late of "Star Trek: The Next Generation", "Homicide: Life on the Streets" and the second season of "24")provide Snake with his only link to the outside world.

Along the way Snake meets surfers (Peter Fonda), the Surgeon General of Beverly Hills (Bruce Campbell in a hilarious role that truly is the highlight of the movie)in pursuit of the device. Oh and once again Snake has one of those huge digital watches attached to his wrist to remind him his days are numbered if he doesn't get the device back in time. Filled with great cameos by Steve Buscemi (as Map to the Stars Eddie), B-movie queen Pam Grier (as Hershe Las Palmas), Italian beauty Valerie Golino, the late Paul Bartel, Issac Hayes (in a cameo) and Robert Carradine "Escape from L.A." just might be Carpenter's most undervalued film (along with the great satire "They Live").

The weakest link in the film turns out to be the uneven visual effects done by Disney's Buena Vista Visual Effects. Some of the opticals look great particularly the scenes where Los Angeles gets hit by the 9.6 earthquake. The sequences involving the mini-sub and some of the helicopters look as if they were taken from computer games. While computer graphics were still developing at the time, I'm surprised that Disney's effects house wasn't able to come up with more convincing visuals for this sequence. Still, while they aren't what they could be they're not the focus of the story either and are a pretty minor problem. Many of the best effects work quite well. The production design by Lawrence G. Paull ("Blade Runner", "Back to the Future", "Predator 2")gives the film a much bigger look than the budget the film had (it cost roughly $50 million to make including the marketing portion of the budget). A bit of trivia about the film. Russell appears wearing the same costume he had for the first film at the beginning. Russell also made all the basketball shots seen in the climatic game himself.

Presented in its original widescreen format with a trailer as the only extra, this was released when Paramount was playing catch up in releasing product for the DVD market. The image quality is exceptionally good with great color reproduction and a nearly flawless print (particularly when compared to the remastered re-release of "Escape from New York")with a nice 5.1 sound mix.

It's too bad this hasn't been reissued with extras (such as a commentary from Carpenter and Russell and one or two featurettes. Heck, there's got to be a promo piece somewhere in Paramount's vault about this as I seem to remember one being released to promote it)because, while isn't quite up to "Escape from New York", "Escape from L.A." is still a memorable sequel with enough satire, parody and humor laced moments to keep fans of the original happy. Hopefully one of these days this minor Carpenter classic will get the re-evaluation it deserves.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Escape From L.A. - Criminally underrated cult classic! February 23, 2006

By Zack H.

Format:DVD

Okay, I'll admit it. John Carpenter's "Escape From L.A." is one of my absolute favorite guilty pleasures. Where else can you see Snake riding a tidal wave? Snake shooting hoops in order to save his life? Or even Snake kicking the entire world's butt?

In 2000, an earthquake seperated Los Angeles from the U.S. and California. Now those who decide not to follow the rules (No smoking, no drugs, no alcohol, no women - unless you're married - no foul language, no red meat!) are sent there, and are not allowed to return to the U.S. In 2013, the president's daughter Utopia has stolen the doomsday device, and has fled to L.A. It's up to ex-special forces war hero Snake Plissken to recover the doomsday device, as well as the president's daughter within nine hours, or the virus he has been injected with will kill him.

The R1 DVD from Paramount features an excellent transfer of the film, but unfortunately, it's non-anamorphic. The film is presented in it's original 2.35:1 widescreen ratio. The DVD also includes a Dolby Digital 5.1 soundtrack, as well as a Dolby Surround 2.0 soundtrack. The only bonus feature on the disc is the theatrical trailer. It'd be nice if Paramount gave us a special edition for EFLA, containing a commentary with John Carpenter and Kurt Russell, as well as the HBO making of featurette, and deleted or extended scenes, if any.

In the end: Escape From L.A. is a minor classic that should not be missed by fans of John Carpenter, Kurt Russell, or fans of "Escape From New York".