This bravura sci-fi actioner remains wildly enjoyable and beloved 45 years after its initial release. Set in a far-off dystopian future of 1997 where the island of Manhattan has been fenced off as a maximum-security prison, ESCAPE FROM NEW YORK tracks the high-octane mission of former-World-War-III-hero-turned-outlaw Snake Plissken. He has 24 hours to rescue the President of the United States (played by Donald Pleasence), who’s crash landed inside the prison metropolis, or a micro-explosive implanted in Plissken’s skull will detonate. Boasting a gritty retro-futuristic atmosphere, ferocious thrills, and a classic Carpenter score, this iconic cult staple stands as an essential entry in director-writer-composer John Carpenter’s hard-edged, subversive oeuvre. Featuring a genre-film dream cast including Lee Van Cleef, Harry Dean Stanton, and Isaac Hayes (just to name a few). One can easily make the case that no one in film history wore an eyepatch better than Kurt Russell’s Plissken (except perhaps Kurt Russell’s Captain Ron).