К 45-летию культового фильма «Побег из Нью-Йорка» в Сент-Луисе пройдет показ и анонсирован ремейк от Зэка Снайдера

St. Louis has had its fair share of film productions over the years, but none are more iconic than director John Carpenter’s Escape from New York, which celebrates its 45th anniversary this summer. For those unfamiliar with Escape from New York, the 1981 film stars Kurt Russell as Snake Plissken, a war hero-turned-bank robber. In this dystopian version of 1997 America, Manhattan has been turned into a maximum-security prison, and Plissken is offered a pardon in exchange for venturing into the dangerous island to rescue the President (Donald Pleasence) after his plane crashes in the heart of the city. What ensues is a race against the clock for Plissken to find the President, rescue him from the Duke of New York (Isaac Hayes), and find a way out of the sci-fi wasteland before a bomb planted inside his head goes off. Stay up-to-date with the local arts scene Subscribe to the weekly St. Louis Arts+Culture newsletter to discover must-attend art exhibits, performances, festivals, and more. Chances are, if you’ve lived in St. Louis for long enough, you’ve likely heard about the massive fire at the Heyday Shoe Factory in 1976 that ravaged a significant portion of downtown. There was still residual damage from the fire around downtown in the years that followed, and alongside other urban decay, it made St. Louis the ideal place to stand in for Carpenter’s dystopian future vision of New York City. The film was shot on location around St. Louis and East St. Louis in the summer and fall of 1980. “We needed a broken down, abandoned New York,” Carpenter says. “At the time, we sent a guy out to scout and he scouted all sorts of places. And we found that you had that big fire and that area of the city was still kind of run down, and that was perfect for us.” Local fans of Escape from New York are quick to spot St. Louis landmarks throughout the film, whether that’s the Fox Theatre, the Masonic Temple, or Union Station standing in for Madison Square Garden, where Kurt Russell memorably faces off against pro wrestler Ox Baker in a gladiatorial wrestling match. (In true St. Louis summer fashion, it was so hot during filming at Union Station that Russell kept sweating off his fake snake tattoo.) In addition to use of these classic landmarks, Carpenter had full cooperation from the city to use multiple city blocks in whatever ways he needed. “They were really kind and they said, ‘Come on over and shut down anything you want,’” Carpenter says. “The city let us take down phone poles and turn the lights out. It was fantastic.” Carpenter even dropped the wreckage of a plane crash in the heart of downtown, which resulted in a few confused calls to the city. On the whole though, this kind of freedom and access to classic-looking locales that were already in disrepair was a dream for Carpenter— especially on a relatively modest $6 million budget. Another St. Louis locale heavily featured in the film is the Old Chain of Rocks Bridge, standing in for the 69th Street Bridge, which is used for the climactic third-act escape. A story perpetuated by the film’s Wikipedia page, stemming from an interview the film’s producer Debra Hill gave to the film magazine Cinefantastique in 1996, even claims that John Carpenter bought the bridge from the local government for a dollar and sold it back to them for a dollar when production wrapped as a way to navigate potential liability issues. For his part, Carpenter has no memory of such a purchase. “I have never heard this before,” Carpenter says. “I don’t know, maybe I did, but I’m not aware of it.” While he may not understand quite why Escape from New York continues to endure as the cult-classic it is, Carpenter is pleased to see the way it has inspired other parts of culture, such as Solid Snake, the stoic eyepatch-wearing protagonist of Hideo Kojima’s acclaimed Metal Gear Solid video game franchise. “[Koijma] wrote me a letter asking me ‘Is it ok?’ and I said ‘Sure,’” Carpenter says. “Any time anybody talks about Escape from New York, they’re talking about Snake Plissken, the guy, and that was all Kurt Russell. His imitation of Clint Eastwood was almost perfect.” Carpenter even went on to further explore the adventures of Snake Plissken, both in the 1996 sequel film, Escape from L.A., and in comic book form, with The Adventures of Snake Plissken and John Carpenter’s Snake Plissken Chronicles. Carpenter continues to explore the art of comics to this day—his latest, John Carpenter’s Cathedral, is out on August 4. Adapted from a cinematic dream Carpenter had, the comic follows a trio of Los Angeles Police Department officers whose investigation of a murder at a rundown cathedral gives way to a dark odyssey through the underworld. “I love comics and grew up reading them,” Carpenter says. “It’s just another way to tell a story and it’s inexpensive compared to making a movie. So, if you have a good artist you’re in business.” Almost as iconic as his filmmaking, Carpenter is also known for doing the music for many of his movies. Cathedral even features its own heavy metal-influenced soundtrack companion album from Carpenter, his son Cody Carpenter, and their longtime collaborator Daniel Davies. “Music has always been a big part of my life, and it’s great fun,” Carpenter says. “It’s less pressure than the movies, and I get to work with my family. It’s a blast, man.” Even as he has stepped away from filmmaking in the past decade, it’s projects like this, both in the studio and on the page, that keep Carpenter excited and inspired, exercising the same creative energy that gave audiences classics like Escape from New York. Today, the film’s legacy lives on both in its cult status and ongoing impact on other media. In June, it was announced that Zack Snyder is set to direct a reimagining of the film for release in theater, with Carpenter serving as executive producer. “It was an adventure story I came up with in the ‘70s, and I didn’t make it until 1980,” Carpenter says. “I hadn’t seen a lot of dystopian future movies. There had been some of them, but there weren’t too many of them. And after Escape, we saw a bunch of dystopian movies, so maybe we had an impact, which is good.” Escape from New York will screen as part of the St. Louis Filmmakers Showcase on July 24 at 8 p.m. Tickets are available online. The film is currently free to stream on Amazon Prime Video, YouTubeTV, The Criterion Channel, The Roku Channel, and Kanopy.