The 1981 John Carpenter film "Escape From New York" is set in a dystopic 1997, when crime has become so bad that all of Manhattan Island has become a maximum-security prison. You'd think that such a movie wouldn't offer much in the way of cars, but in fact you'll see some top-notch post-apocalyptic Detroit machinery roaming the streets of the city — not a lot of them, but what we get is every bit as good as the cars in the Lord Humungus Motor Pool in another 1981 cinematic masterpiece. Let's take a look at these fine machines.
The most memorable vehicle in the film is, of course, the 1977 Cadillac Fleetwood Brougham that serves as The Duke of New York’s flagship. The fender-mounted chandeliers should have been a factory option.
Isaac Hayes as the Duke of New York, the menacing boss of Manhattan, was a brilliant piece of casting. After all, he was the genius who created the Shaft soundtrack a decade earlier. Can you dig it?
Ernest Borgnine’s character, Cabbie, claims to have been driving the same Checker Taxi for 30 years, somehow finding it after being sentenced to some heinous crime and sent to the car’s old stomping grounds. The Internet Movie Cars Database says this is a ’74 Taxi, though 30 years prior to 1997 would have been earlier; we’ll just need to apply a bit of suspension-of-disbelief here. The most likely engines in this car would have been a Chevrolet 250 straight-six or 350 V8, but we can assume that the inmates may have done a bit of powertrain swapping on their wheels.
The Duke of New York appears to have an extensive vehicle collection, though nearly all the film’s action takes place at night and we get a look at just a few of his cars. Here’s a 1978 Pontiac Catalina sedan from his motorcade.
While the Duke doesn’t seem to have any Chrysler products in his stable of vehicles, he does have this luxurious 1975 Mercury Marquis coupe.
My personal favorite of all the Escape From New York cars is this evil-looking 1976 Ford Country Squire wagon, which Snake Plissken acquires through the use of ultraviolence.
Snake’s Country Squire boasts wire-mesh windows and crude steel armor plates, which turn out to be essential modifications for life on the streets of New York.
The only non-Detroit car that gets any real screen time is this 1971 Toyota Corolla two-door sedan (I won’t spoil it for those of you who haven’t seen the film, but there’s something special in the engine compartment). The second-generation Corolla had only gone on sale in the United States in 1970, so a ’71 model would have been a rare car even in pre-prison New York City.
Considering the penny-pinching budget of this film, we think the car selection was excellent… but it would have been nice if they’d managed to sneak in a new Maserati Quattroporte.
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