LEAVE THE BRONX. Sign up for a new house in enchanting New Mexico.
Escape 2000, originally known as Escape from the Bronx, is the 1983 sequel to the 1982 post-apocalyptic action film 1990: The Bronx Warriors, which combined The Warriors with Escape from New York in its tale of Rebellious Non Royal Princess Ann falling in love with biker punk Trash (Mark Gregory) as they try to stop her family's MegaCorp from oppressing the Wretched Hive that is THE "future" BRONX.
Years later, a new MegaCorp, the General Construction Corporation, is planning to put the entirety of THE BRONX through urban renewal, and their Mooks are forcing people to "LEAVE THE BRONX" for new houses in New Mexico by any means necessary — one way or another. Trash and a few others continue to fight on the surface, but many of the gangs, led by textbook Boisterous Bruiser Dablone (Antonio Sabato), are content to hide underground until everything blows over.
Trash saves an Intrepid Reporter who nearly died trying to expose the truth of the GCC's actions, and she suggests a more direct way to stop the GCC — kidnap the company's president and hold him hostage!
For the Mystery Science Theater 3000 version, please go to the episode recap page. 1990: The Bronx Warriors was riffed by RiffTrax in Video On Demand format in 2019, with Escape from the Bronx getting the treatment three years later
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Not to be confused with the Ozploitation film Turkey Shoot, which was also marketed as Escape 2000 in the US.
1990: The Bronx Warriors and Escape from the Bronx/Escape 2000 contain examples of:
- Artistic License – Geography: THE BRONX has always been known for its scenic views of Lower Manhattan, and the Williamsburg Bridge is the best way to get to Riverdale.
- The Bad Guy Wins: Hoffman, the new president of the company had already seized control, successfully pinned the deaths from the final battle on the gangs before it was even fought, and can probably refresh his forces with a single job fair. Meanwhile Wengler (the most unstable and publicly criticized element of his company) and the entire resistance are all dead leaving the area open to development. It should be noted, however, that in the complete version (since the Mystery Science Theater 3000 episode edited some footage out due to time issues) Junior kills Hoffman with a grenade.
- Big Bad:
- 1990: The Bronx Warriors has the unnamed Vice President of the Manhattan Corporation, who sends Hammer to go after Ann.
- Escape 2000 has President Clark, the executive who ordered the genocide of the Bronx.
- Black-and-Grey Morality: Bordering on Evil Versus Evil if not for Moon, who at least as the best interests of the people at heart, though she is a Well-Intentioned Extremist herself.
- Boisterous Bruiser: Dablone, a musclebound gang leader who chews the scenery with gusto. It used to be called "The Toblerone" in his honor.
- Bottomless Magazines: Good luck trying to find anybody reloading in these films.
- Brick Joke: Trash gets his team out of a confrontation with the tapdancing Ironmen in the first film by promising to sleep with their leader. In the second film she has a cameo and tells Trash "listen, honey, I am still waiting."
- Camp Gay: Some of Dablone's rebels look more like a Broadway musical cast.
- Canned Orders over Loudspeaker: LEAVE THE BRONX! YOU ARE ORDERED TO LEAVE THE BRONX!
- Card-Carrying Villain: Wengler. He even says informatively, "I'm worse than anyone."
- Cluster F-Bomb: Examples abound.Trash: You fuck! It could be a pile of shit from someone's asshole!
- Corporate Conspiracy: The General Construction Corporation has a Robocop-esque plan to turn a crime-ridden Bronx into a new planned community... which would be good, except they hire a Psycho for Hire and a bunch of silver-suited stormtroopers to forcibly evacuate the Bronx, killing anyone who tries to resist and/or investigate their crimes. And as it turns out, there's an additional conspiracy within the corporation by the vice-president to usurp the company from his boss.
- Corrupt Corporate Executive: President Clark, everyone from the Manhattan Corporation. Actually, Clark is an altar boy compared to his assistant Hoffman, who uses Floyd Wengler to bump him off and take over as President.
- Creator Cameo: Director Enzo G. Castellari appears as a corporate flunky in Bronx Warriors and the mustachioed radio operator in Escape 2000.
- Downer Ending: Trash may have gotten his revenge in The Bronx Warriors, but all the people he knows and loves are dead, Ann especially.
- The Dragon: Floyd Wengler, the chief enforcer for the GC Corporation in Escape.
- Dull Surprise: Trash. Unsurprising since Mark Gregory was a salesman at a shoe store in Rome before Castellari spotted him and made him the lead in these films.
- Dumb Muscle: This was probably not the intention but Trash certainly comes off as this, although moreso in the second film than the first.
- Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Moon Grey, AKA the Rat Woman.
- '80s Hair: Trash looks like the drummer from Ratt...'s brother.
- Every Car/Helicopter Is a Pinto: And all it takes is a few shots from a little revolver. Who knew? Apparently GMC vans will explode if you shoot them with a shotgun.
- Evil Plan:
- 1990: The Bronx Warriors: Hammer the Exterminator, under the Vice President's orders, seeks to capture the late President's daughter so she'll be the VP's puppet.
- Escape 2000: President Clark seeks to slaughter THE BRONX so he can gentrify it.
- Evil Versus Evil: The company wants to use lethal force to drive out the citizens of THE BRONX, while the "heroes" want to preserve THE BRONX as is to continue selling drugs and ruling the citizens with gang violence, crime and fear. Either way, it must really suck to be an ordinary citizen in THE BRONX.
- Excuse Me While I Multitask: Trash discovering his murdered parents in Escape from the Bronx is played as a tragic scene — and, in an instance where "added realism" can come off as a little absurd, he's also in the midst of killing his way through a gang of hostile scavengers that are looting what they can from the building. In the time between him seeing the bodies of his mother and father, he gets the drop on a guy ambushing him and shoots him in the back, and the sad music never stops.
- Eyepatch of Power: Big Little Man, one of Toblerone's henchmen.
- Face Death with Dignity: After the Ogre is fatally wounded at the climax of 1990: The Bronx Warriors and everything starts to burn around him thanks to all of the flamethrower-wielding goons, he sits back on his throne and puffs on One Last Smoke before being engulfed by the fire.
- Gang of Hats: Bronx Warriors prominently featured this trope, with Trash's gang, the Riders (All Bikers are Hells Angels — with the actual Hells Angels MC credited) fighting other Bronx gangs like the Zombies (roller hockey players wearing white Stalhelm helmets and huge quilted shoulderpads — we don't know, either), the Tigers (Fred Williamson's colorfully dressed multiethnic mobsters with classic Rolls-Royce cars), the Ironmen (tap-dancing Dance Battlers wearing KISS makeup), and many more. Escape From The Bronx downplays this trope, but members of all of the gangs show up in Dablone's Hidden Elf Village.
- Hair-Trigger Temper: Sugar in Floyd Wengler's coffee makes him CRAZY!
- Hate Sink:
- 1990: The Bronx Warriors: Hammer the Exterminator is a mercenary who left the crime-ridden Bronx to make a name for himself. When the daughter of a recently-deceased MegaCorp president flees to the Bronx so the Vice President can't use her as a puppet, Hammer is sent in to capture or eliminate her. When the girl is defended by a criminal named Trash, Hammer kills some of his gang and pays others to betray them. When this doesn't work, he starts a Mob War with a rival group so he can kill the two and escape undetected. Trash manages to end the war, so Hammer gives up and has some thugs burn both gangs alive.
- Escape 2000:
- Floyd Wengler is a mercenary hired to clear out the Bronx so it can be gentrified. Being Only in It for the Money unlike his well-intentioned bosses, Wengler immediately starts massacring the borough. Trash survives one of these attacks and starts a rebellion, so Wengler has various rebels' relatives kidnapped and forced to suicide bomb their base. When his boss President Clark is kidnapped, Wengler takes the opportunity to betray him so his replacement can pay him more, forcing his goons to kill themselves in booby traps while he hunts them down. The people of the Bronx start to openly revolt against Wengler, so he simply abandons his men to their fates, killing anybody who hinders his escape.
- Vice President Hoffman is one of the people managing the gentrification project, and easily the most loathsome of the bosses. Happily signing off on Wengler's genocidal plans, Hoffman secretly plots to usurp the company from Clark. He seizes an opportunity to do so when Clark is kidnapped, offering Wengler a raise if he kills him. After the assassination succeeds, Hoffman has his chauffeur drive him away from the ensuing battle between his men and the Bronx's residents in cowardice.
- Hidden Elf Village: Dablone tries running his underground hideout like one of these under THE BRONX; it doesn't work out that well.
- Intrepid Reporter: Moon Grey and her photographer friend.
- Jerkass: Trash, Hammer the Exterminator, Floyd Wengler, and that's just the start.
- Kill It with Fire: Both movies have Mooks wielding flamethrowers.
- Klingon Promotion: Apparently how corporations work.
- Large Ham:
- There is no ham too large for DABLONE, eh!? AH-HA-HA-HA!
- Unless you count Floyd Wengler, as portrayed by the incomparable Henry Silva. PRO-CEEEED!!!
- Left Hanging: In 1990: The Bronx Warriors, Trash may have gotten his revenge on Hammer, but the plot thread with the Manhattan Corporation wanting Ann back so she can be their puppet executive never gets resolved, especially since she dies.
- Left the Background Music On: An extended conversation between gangs in The Bronx Warriors happens while a drum player (who is there on the pier for some reason) keeps practicing.
- Made of Explodium: Damn near everything.
- Man on Fire: Several, from both films, in fact. Bronx Warriors ends with Hammer summoning flamethrower-wielding mooks from the National Guard to kill Ann, Ogre, and the rest of the sympathetic Bronx gang members except Trash. Escape has the Disinfestators graphically torch a random homeless person as part of their Establishing Character Moment, soon followed up by burning Trash's parents in their apartment.
- MegaCorp: Manhattan Corporation in The Bronx Warriors and GCC in Escape 2000.
- A Million Is a Statistic: Both in-universe, GCC causing a genocide in the Bronx and showing no remorse whatsoever; and the movie itself, due to the sheer number of mooks, civilians, and secondary characters in both sides, and all sans two of them wind up dead by the end of Escape 2000.
- The Mockbuster: The title is an obvious cash-in of Escape from New York. The similarities don't end there, but then again, the plots are completely different.
- Mooks: Oh so many, on both sides.
- Non-Indicative Name: It's not really an escape from THE BRONX. They're welcome to LEAVE THE BRONX. The entire point is not to LEAVE THE BRONX.
- Now What?: Escape 2000's ending suggests that this is what Trash is thinking.
- Ojou: Ann in the first film. She's the daughter of the Manhattan Corporation's president.
- Psycho for Hire:
- Hammer the Exterminator in The Bronx Warriors.
- Wengler in Escape 2000.
- Pyrrhic Victory: Sure Trash manages to stay in the Bronx, but only Junior and Strike survive and everybody else who helped him or wanted to stay in the Bronx is dead, his family is dead, the gangs were completely wiped out, his girlfriend from the first movie is dead, half of the Bronx was destroyed and/or demolished in the battle, the two reporters that tried to expose GCC's genocide in the Bronx are dead, and the General Construction Corporation, the company made the whole mess to begin with is still at large.
- Rebellious Princess: Ann is the daughter of the leader of the MegaCorp, and a whole lot more humane.
- Revolvers Are Just Better: Trash racks up an impressive body count with just a small handgun, even managing to destroy a helicopter with it.
- The Sociopath: Floyd Wengler, a mercenary who'll commit genocide for money, and betray his boss for the same.
- The Starscream: Vice President Hoffman.
- The Strategist: Strike, the master criminal our anti-heroes persuade to help kidnap the GCC president.
- Moon Grey might count as well, since she's the one who thought up the kidnapping plan to begin with.
- Stuff Blowing Up: Might be one of the best examples.
- Tagalong Kid: Junior, Strike's son, who accompanies his father on all of his jobs.
- Unknown Rival: Trash and Wengler never meet nor share a single scene together through all of Escape 2000. Trash never even knows of his existence or plans, and kills him only because the other tried to run him over with a truck and shot him in the process.
- Unusually Uninteresting Sight: In 1990: The Bronx Warriors, a captive Ann is watching The Ogre (Fred Williamson), who's in an all-out swordfight with the villainous gang leader who's holding her. (The Ogre and Trash teamed up; Trash was going to rescue Ann while The Ogre kept the guy busy.) Ann has a "meh" look on her face through the entire fight...
- Villainous Gentrification: The goal of GCC in Escape 2000 is to gentrify the Bronx and get rid of the criminals who enforce its status as a Wretched Hive. Okay, that is good. The company does this by having its soldiers raid the neighborhoods and kill everything that moves with flamethrowers and machine guns. Definitely bad.
- Wardens Are Evil: Early on in Escape 2000, Floyd Wengler, the mercenary leader and murderous maniac extraordinaire, is mentioned to be a former prison warden - and the "former" part is because he's been expelled.
- What a Drag: 1990: The Bronx Warriors ends with Trash spearing Hammer the Exterminator through the gut when he decides to gloat about the massacre he led at the climax, attach the spear's chain to the back of his motorcycle, and drive off with Hammer behind.
- Wretched Hive: THE BRONX. It's a hellhole full of gangs and the faction willing to Clean Up the Town is evil and going up to eleven with said mandate (to the point of borderline Omnicidal Mania).
- You Have Outlived Your Usefulness: Bye bye President Clark.
- You Killed My Father: Trash's entire family is slaughtered early in Escape 2000. He becomes more eager to wipe out the antagonists as a result.
- You Monster!: Floyd Wengler is said to be this.Moon Grey: [to a press conference] Now we all know who Floyd Wengler is: a torturer, an expelled prison warder, a KILLER!...President Clark: You're worse then they are, Mr. Wengler.
- Younger Than They Look: Mark Gregory was 17 when Bronx Warriors was filmed yet easily could pass for a buff dude in his late twenties.
