Kurt Russell remains a beloved actor with roles in several big genre films over the years, but one of his biggest bombs almost destroyed his best character. In 1981, John Carpenter was coming off a critical disappointment with his 1980 horror movie The Fog, which failed to match up to the brilliance of his landmark horror movie Halloween. Carpenter went in a different direction with his next movie, a dystopian sci-fi action thriller starring Kurt Russell called Escape from New York. What resulted was a cult classic that remains an iconic film to this day. Over a decade later, Carpenter and Russell returned to the franchise, and it was a considerable letdown.
30 years ago, on August 9, 1996, Carpenter released Escape from L.A., with Russell returning as Snake Plissken, and the movie was a commercial and critical failure, ending the plans for an eventual trilogy. Here is how it all went wrong.
Escape from L.A. Couldn’t Match the Brilliance of Escape from New York
The biggest problem with Escape from L.A. was that it never came close to matching the brilliance of Escape from New York, which was the perfect movie released at the perfect time in American history. Escape from New York hit after the events of Watergate began to erode trust in the American political system, and dystopian films became more popular as a counterpoint to the country at that time. With Russell on target as Snake Plissken, a decorated war hero and former Special Forces soldier disillusioned with his own country, it was a perfect storm. The movie enjoyed a decent box office run, but it became a massive success on home video.
It took Carpenter 15 years to follow up on the movie. The timing could not have been worse for another dystopian thriller. Unlike the first movie, with a society that was coming off Watergate with an ultra-conservative president in office, Escape from L.A. came out when a liberal president had been in office for almost four years. As a result, a movie about a hyper-conservative United States president who exiled anyone who didn’t conform had little connection with society at the time. Snake was the same, but the real world had changed.
The big problem is that this sequel had been sitting in development for 10 years. It went into development during Ronald Reagan’s presidency and then continued on into George H.W. Bush’s one-term tenure. It took all that time for the script to get written, with Carpenter telling IGN that he “manipulated” Russell into helping write it. By that time, though, it was too late for most fans who loved the original movie.
Escape from L.A. made almost the same amount as Escape from New York, bringing in $42.3 million compared to New York’s $50 million. However, New York cost only $6 million to make, and L.A. cost $50 million, making it a box office bomb. The biggest collapse came in the reaction to the movies. Escape from New York has a 71% critical score on Rotten Tomatoes and a 77% from the audience. Escape from L.A. has a 45% critical score and a lower 39% audience rating. The movie was still a sharp satire of the dystopian action genre, but it just didn’t hit the same highs as its predecessor.
This ended the chances of the final movie in the planned trilogy. That third movie was Escape from Earth, which would have picked up immediately after the ending of Escape from L.A. In this movie, Snake would have been in a space capsule, flying interstellar. It might be good that it was never made, because Carpenter told Fandom that it would have a lot of special effects, which he doesn’t care about.
Escape from L.A.‘s Failure Was Normal Throughout John Carpenter’s Career
John Carpenter has struggled in his directorial career, and many times, it has little to do with anything he did wrong. After breaking out with Dark Star and Assault on Precinct 13, Carpenter enjoyed a massive hit with his horror movie Halloween, the film best known for helping popularize the slasher genre. As the writer, he was pushed into bringing back Michael Myers for a sequel, and then, when he tried to move the story away from the masked killer in the third movie, he left the franchise he helped create after that movie flopped and he refused to return to the Michael Myers story.
He directed a movie in 1982 that is considered one of the best horror films in history with The Thing, but it was a box office and critical failure, and it caused him to lose the chance to direct Stephen King’s Firestarter as a result. The reason The Thing failed was that its dark sci-fi story turned away audiences who had fallen in love with E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial that same year. Blade Runner failed at the box office as well thanks to E.T. It took years for The Thing to achieve its level of success thanks to home video, and that delay did little to help Carpenter get the jobs he wanted in the future.
He has several beloved cult classics to his name, including Big Trouble in Little China, Prince of Darkness, They Live, and In the Mouth of Madness, but none of them were big box office successes, and all of them enjoyed more success on home video than in theaters.
Escape from L.A. flopped at the box office for one big reason. It was up against another sci-fi movie in Independence Day, and just like with The Thing, the optimism of that movie hurt the nihilistic story in Carpenter’s film. After this, Carpenter’s career began to wind down. In 1998, he had another flop with Vampires, and then he stepped away from directing after his next movie, Ghosts of Mars, made only $14 million on a $28 million budget. It seemed his career had ended, and sadly, Carpenter has directed only one movie since then, with the 2010 horror film The Ward, another box office flop.
Now, 30 years later, it might be time to reappraise Escape from L.A. Carpenter has said he believes it is a better film than Escape from New York. The character of Snake Plissken has remained iconic to this day, appearing in comic books, and he even has a character based on him in the Metal Gear Solid series. Carpenter is used to his movies not being hits when released, and Escape from L.A. might play better today than it did when released in 1996.
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