Escape From New York (1981)

Film of 2012 #64


The John Carpenter film starring Kurt Russell as Snake Plissken, New York has been walled off as a maximum security prison and the inmates are allowed to run free. A Terrorist takes Airforce One and crashes the plane and the President is played by Donald Pleasence ejects and lands in New York and the army have to get him out. So they use Snake as the best at what he does to go in and get him out. He meets Ernest Borgnine as the Cabbie and runs into Isaac Hayes who is the Duke of New York and the person who runs the city. Lee Van Cleef as Hauk and Adrienne Barbeau as Maggie round out the cast from this 80's cult favourite.

Scored by John Carpenter this film is another of his very strong 80's films with a strong cast and interesting story, even if it is a bit contrived. This film looks at a society where criminal actions and violence reach such a peak that it becomes viable and acceptbale to shut off New York and turn it into a prison and as plot point in a film it is good as it gives you a famous city to run around and you can make up your own rules as anything goes. There is some interesting thoughts on how far people would go to survive with some of the lower class criminals running around the sewers eating people and others trying to make some form of living by doing what would be considered a normal job, such as Cabbie. This falls into the Action genre with some social commentary but really it is about the fight scenes and the chase scenes and the desperation of Snake trying to get the president. There is also another story with the problem being there is a threat to the whole world safety based on what the president has in his brief case. 

I really enjoy this film with Kurt Russell totally over acting in the role of Snake and really playing the bad-ass. The score and direction from Carpenter paint a really dark and scary future and there is very little light in the story, I would say this is a 4 star recommend if you enjoy anything that Carpenter has done in the past.

RED (2010)

This comic book adaptation sees Bruce Willis, John Malkovich, Morgan Freeman and Helen Mirren as retired operatives that come out or retirement when a Black-ops team invade Bruce Willis; home and try to kill him. It is a hilarious action comedy that brings together a stellar cast to romp through some serious explosions and action sequences.

I have to say that I was looking forward to seeing this film, as a non-comic book reader I had never heard of the series before the film and had not seen that much about it. I just thin that the cast alone was worth watching and seeing what they could do with a basically solid story idea. The action and acting did not disappoint me I have to say that there were some set ups and ideas that made me laugh out loud, the love stories are actually something special.

This is a solid recommend from me and I hope that if you have not seen it then you will give it the time it is well worth it and funny enough to pass the 2 hour running time, 4 shinning stars from me.

The Posiedon Adventure (1972)

The classic ship disaster movie with Gene Hackman and Ernest Borgnine is a classic of the highest order I have to say that I enjoyed re-watching this film as it is a few years since I have seen it and probably the first time since I saw the remake. You have a straight performance as the captain by Leslie Neilson, the first time I have seen him on film since his sad demise and I have to say that I think he is an a awesome actor. So you have the fact the ship ends up overturned and you get an excellent practical effect when the ship rolls and Gene Hackman playing the priest who has lost his faith in God taking control to try and save everybody.

You end up with a small group of people being lead by Gene and you have some in fighting amongst themselves with what the best option to do and the inevitable threats and danger from an overturned cruise liner. I have to say that my favourite characters are the Rosen's they are such a lovely couple and some of the lines between each other are fantastic, my favourite being, "when was the last time we said I love you to each other?", "what does it matter?" so simple and could be taken wrong in today's cynical outlook but I like to consider it as why does it matter we are here together and we have been together forever and we know we love each other.

So you have a cast of awesome actors that take an adventure story in a strange location and they have to escape from the threat, one of the best parts is that there is no real bad guy in this film it is simply a disaster which I do not think they do very well at the moment. This is 4 stars it loses a bit over time but will always be re-watchable to me and I look forward to revisiting again in the future.