Escape from the Bronx (1983)

Trailer: 

*Spoilers Throughout*

What’s This About: Escapers run afoul of The Bronx.

Here are some of my observations as I watched the film:

• Right away people are being ordered to leave the Bronx and move to a new house in New Mexico. So, not much of an “escape,” per se.
• Wait, don’t they mean New America?
• I guess this movie’s about gentrification? But what about the magical charm of early ’80s Bronx?
• The spacesuited Gestapo is forcing these people out of their burned out buildings, I’m sure the promise of a nice house somewhere else is bullshit, but how could it be any worse?
• A guy is sleeping on the ground so they just set him on fire. I bet those are the same flamethrowers from the end of the previous picture. The director loves those things!
• IT’S TRASH! He’s traded in his chopper (R.I.P. Vic Morrow) for a crotch rocket, for some reason somehow. At least he still has a glowing skull on it.
• Hahaha he shoots at a helicopter (R.I.P. Vic Morrow) with a revolver and it explodes, complete with dummy flying out. That’s great shootin’, Trash.
• HAHAHA Trash’s parents have a huge black and white poster of Trash from the first movie on the wall. Maybe he gave it to them for Christmas one year.
• I guess these leatherboys are the new Riders. And there’s The Iron Men!! And I guess the Tigers. It’s nice to see that the Zombies kept up their roller hockey aesthetic after their leader was killed.
• Interesting choice to dub this guy Dablone with a barely intelligible accent.
• All the gangs are now living together underground, and Trash delivers guns and ammo to them. He should also be providing them with a steady supply of vitamin D and some antiseptic for constant rat bites.
• Trash goes to his parents’ place and he’s trying to have an emotional moment over their dead bodies but a bunch of dudes keep running in and he keeps shooting them and it’s hilarious.
• Oh cool it’s the blonde Italian company president from the first movie. He was Ann’s dad, as you’ll no doubt recall.
• Ah so they’re building a futuristic city on top of the Bronx. In reality there are just normal houses there now. Not nearly as cool.

• What do the Yankees have to say about all this?
• Speaking of which, yanking innocent people out of their homes and forcefully deporting them is just too far-fetched.
• Disinfestation Annihilation Squad (DAS). So this is just ICE with shiny silver jumpsuits.
• Another outrageously made-up scenario: the press pushing back on this corrupt president. Give me a break, movie! 
• Henry Silva has a cool look and makes a decent Nazi but acting-wise Vic Morrow is head and shoulders above him.
• The miniature buildings they’re blowing up look like Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.
• Henry Silva’s character is named Wrangler, named after the jeans he wears while wrangling people.
• If these shiny spacesuits aren’t flame-resistant, are they just for fashion?
• Ha so many fake body explosions in this scene, I am delighted.
• If you’re trying to lay low in an off-limits area, maybe don’t wear a red and yellow sweater and a scarf that’s redder than a baboon’s ass at Christmastime.
• I was just wondering if Trash (Mark Gregory) was in anything else, and while he acted in a handful of other things, he quit acting abruptly in 1989 and basically lost all of his money and had psychological problems and committed suicide by taking a bunch of pills in 2013. Rest In Trash.
• Trash and the lady reporter, Moon, go to see Strike because they want him to kidnap the blonde company president. Are YOU a bad enough dude to kidnap the president?
• Wait, kidnapping a president in a lawless wasteland? Where have I seen that before? Ah yes, Driving Miss Daisy.
• Does Strike know Moon already? She’s taking his sexual assault really well if not. But you can’t have an Italian-made post-apocalyptic movie without one.
• “There are more ways to die down here than a Bruce Lee film.” What??
• It’s so funny watching them sneak around above ground while Manhattan is perfectly functional behind them. It really takes you clear out of the atmosphere they’re going for.
• The area they came out to from underground is the same area as the Tigers hideout in the previous picture. R.I.P. Ogre.

• So I’m not cool with people being torn out of their homes of course, but on the other hand these unsafe decaying buildings absolutely need to be torn down. The area could use a nice Top Golf.
• I can’t believe Gibbous Moon was killed already.
• I think across these two movies about 87 people are set on fire.
• So Strike has a badass little son, but he also has an unintelligible accident, and it makes zero sense because he’s like 7 and was born and raised in the Bronx, and Strike doesn’t have an accent. 
• I guess this is the escape. It’s basically a bunch of small explosions. And that adorable kid basically makes this Home Alone: Italian Sewer Adventure.
• Also, they seem to be ending up in the same locations in this sewer, like when they use the same background when a character is running in an old cartoon.
• I think Henry Silva just broke the 4th wall.
• Abolish DAS!
• This big climactic battle between DAS and the gangs is cool and all but it seems like the whole kidnapping the president thing didn’t amount to jack shit. I mean now Wrangler and the corporation want him dead so they can take over, but who cares?

• Yeah that’s that for him. Good plan all around, everyone.
• How exactly did Strike just blow up the cardboard DAS van with a shotgun?
• Ha well I guess the same way he just blew up the replacement president’s miniature Porsche. Maybe they’re atomic shotgun shells.
• More legs getting run over. At least this time they were dummies. I think.
• Trash shoots Wrangler’s DAS truck with a revolver and it blows up, once again. I don’t think that’s how that works.
• Well DAS is abolished I guess, but everyone but Trash, Strike, and the boy are now dead, so, good job?? At least the area won’t be gentrified. Though, it likely still will. I doubt that was just a two-person corporation.

What year?!: Seems like shortly after the previous movie, so 1991?

Who are the Enemies?: Starbucks.

What Happened to the Earth?: Wrangled.

Final Thoughts: This is essentially the same movie as the first one with some slight differences. Not as much Nazi biker gang, more Nazi wranglers. So yeah if you liked the first one it’s more of the same. Probably not quite as fun but there are more unnecessary explosions, at least. Recommended for housing developers, New Mexico residents, Bruce Lee film preservationists, and fire fetishists.

Score: 5.5 Small Sewer Explosions (out of 10)