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Escape from L.A.
Model page: Escape from New York

Plot
In 1998, Los Angeles has become crime-ridden and decadent. A massive earthquake strikes the city two years later, cutting it off from the mainland as the San Fernando Valley floods. Declaring that God is punishing Los Angeles for its sins, a theocratic presidential candidate wins election to a lifetime term of office. He orders the United States capital relocated from Washington, D.C. to his hometown of Lynchburg, Virginia and enacts a series of strict morality laws. Violators are given a choice between loss of U.S. citizenship and permanent deportation to the new Los Angeles Island, or repentance and death by electrocution. Escape from the island is made impossible due to a containment wall erected along the mainland shore and a heavy federal police presence monitoring the area.

By 2013, the U.S. has developed a superweapon known as the "Sword of Damocles," a satellite system capable of targeting electronic devices anywhere in the world and rendering them useless. The president intends to use it to dominate the world by destroying hostile nations' ability to function. His daughter Utopia steals the remote control for the system and escapes to Los Angeles Island in order to deliver it to Cuervo Jones, a Peruvian Shining Path revolutionary who has seduced and brainwashed her. Cuervo has marshaled an invasion force of third world nations and is planning to attack and reclaim the U.S.

Facing deportation for a series of crimes, Snake Plissken is offered a chance to earn a pardon by traveling to the island and recovering the remote, a task that a previous rescue team had failed to accomplish. To force his compliance, the president has one of his officers infect Snake with a virus that will kill him within 10 hours; once he completes his mission, he will receive the cure. The president is not concerned with Utopia's safety, regarding her as a traitor.

Snake is issued equipment and sent to Los Angeles in a one-man submarine, which he loses upon arrival when the ledge on which he has landed collapses into the ocean. As he explores the island, he meets "Map to the Stars" Eddie, a swindler who sells interactive tours and one of Cuervo's associates. Along the way, Snake is helped by Pipeline, a surfing enthusiast; Taslima, a woman deported for her Muslim faith; and Hershe Las Palmas (formerly Carjack Malone), a transgender woman and past criminal associate of Snake's.

Eddie captures Snake and turns him over to Cuervo, who uses the Sword of Damocles to shut down Lynchburg in retaliation for sending Snake after him. He threatens to inflict the same fate on the rest of the U.S. unless his demands are met. Snake escapes and fights Cuervo at the invasion staging area, the "Happy Kingdom" in Anaheim, taking the remote from him. Eddie alters the remote for his tours to match the real one. Snake, Eddie, Utopia, Hershe, and a group of defectors from Cuervo's forces leave the island in a helicopter; Eddie shoots Cuervo, who fires a rocket launcher at them before dying. Snake, Eddie, and Utopia escape before the rocket hits the helicopter and causes it to crash into a mountain, killing everyone aboard.

At the crash site, the president and his officers find that both Snake and Utopia are carrying remotes and take the one held by Utopia (slipped into her pocket without her noticing), thinking that Snake has switched them. As Utopia is taken to the electric chair despite her pleas for forgiveness, Snake learns that the virus infecting him only causes a severe case of influenza that subsides within hours. The president tries to use Utopia's remote to neutralize an invasion force threatening Florida, but it only plays a recorded introduction to one of Eddie's tours.

Furious, the president orders his officers to kill Snake on the spot, but he proves to be only a hologram projected from a miniature camera that had been issued to him. Disgusted at the world's never-ending class warfare, he programs the real remote and triggers every satellite in the Sword of Damocles system, deactivating all technology on Earth. Utopia is saved when the power fails just before she can be electrocuted. Snake tosses the now-useless camera aside and lights a cigarette, then blows out the match and mutters, "Welcome to the human race."

(Clean up/tighten)

Production
The film was in development for over 10 years. At one point, a script was commissioned in 1987 and was written by screenwriter Coleman Luck, with Dino De Laurentiis's company producing. Carpenter later described the script as "too light, too campy". In time, Carpenter and Kurt Russell got together to write with their long-time collaborator Debra Hill. Carpenter insists that Russell's persistence allowed the film to be made, since "Snake Plissken was a character he loved and wanted to play again."

(update to include production anecdotes from interviews with Carpenter, particularly his description of co-writing with Russel in IGN interview and info from production designer interview)

Home media
The film was released on Blu-ray on May 4, 2010.

On February 22nd, 2022, Paramount Pictures Home Entertainment rereleased the film on Blu-ray in 4K Ultra HD. Upon release, an English audio encoding error was noted by several reviewers, prompting Paramount to correct the issue in unreleased discs and initiate a replacement program for initial purchasers.

(update to include new 4k release, perhaps include prior Laserdisc/dvd releases like the NY page)