Escape from New York (1981) - Quotes

Taglines: New York City has become the only maximum security prison for the entire country. Once you go in, you don't come out... until today.

Taglines: 1997. New York City is now a maximum security prison. Breaking out is impossible. Breaking in is insane.

Taglines: The world's greatest leader is a hostage in the most dangerous place on Earth. Now only the deadliest man alive can save him.

Bob Hauk: You're gonna kill me now, Snake?

Snake Plissken: [pause] I'm too tired. Maybe later.

Bob Hauk: I've got another deal for you. I want you to think it over while you're resting. I want to give you a job. We'd make one hell of a team, Snake!

Snake Plissken: [coldly glares at Hauk; leaves in disgust] The name's Plissken!

Snake Plissken: Where's the President?

Cabbie: The Duke got him. Everybody knows the Duke's got him. You don't have to put a gun to my head. I'll tell you.

Snake Plissken: Who's the Duke?

Cabbie: The Duke? The Duke of New York, A-Number-1, the Big Man, that's who!

Snake Plissken: I wanna meet this Duke.

Cabbie: You can't meet the Duke! Are you crazy? Nobody gets to meet the Duke. You meet him once and then you're dead!

Bob Hauk: In 22 hours, the Hartford Summit Meeting will be over. China and the Soviet Union will go back home. Now, the President was on his way to the summit when his plane went down. He has a briefcase attached to his wrist. The tape recording inside has to reach Hartford in 22 hours.

Snake Plissken: What's on it?

Bob Hauk: You know anything about nuclear fusion?

Snake Plissken: No.

Bob Hauk: The survival of the human race, Plissken. Something you don't give a shit about.

Cronenberg: [approaching Snake with two injection guns; places both guns on the sides of Snake's neck and injects him, producing a loud bang] I'm going to inject you. It will sting for a second.

Bob Hauk: That's it, Plissken.

Cronenberg: Tell him.

Snake Plissken: Tell me what?

Bob Hauk: That idea you had about turning the Gullfire around 180 degrees and flying off to Canada.

Snake Plissken: What did you do to me, asshole!?

Bob Hauk: [makes the OK sign with his right hand] My idea, Plissken. Something we've been fooling around with. Two microscopic capsules lodged in your arteries. They're already starting to dissolve. In 22 hours, the cores will completely dissolve. Inside the cores are a heat-sensing charge. Not a large explosion, about the size of a pinhead, just big enough to open up both of your arteries. I'd say you'd be dead in 10-15 seconds...

Snake Plissken: [chokes Hauk] Take them out, now!

Cronenberg: [nervously] They're protected by the cores. Fifteen minutes before the last hour is up, we can neutralize the charge with X-rays.

Bob Hauk: We'll burn out the charges if you have the President.

Snake Plissken: What if I'm a little late?

Bob Hauk: No more Hartford Summit. And no more Snake Plissken.

Snake Plissken: When I get back, I'm going to kill you.

Bob Hauk: The Gullfire's waiting.

Bob Hauk: [He puts his glasses on, leans forward; reading Plissken's file; puts down the papers he has read; to Plissken, directly] I'm not a fool, Plissken. S.D. Plissken... American, Lieutenant: Special Forces Unit "Black Light". Two Purple Hearts, Leningrad and Siberia. Youngest man to be decorated by the President. Then you robbed the Federal Reserve Depository... life sentence, New York maximum security penitentiary. I'm ready to kick your ass out of the world, war hero...

Snake Plissken: [calmly strikes a match against Hauk's desk to light his cigarette and in a bored tone of voice] Who're you?

Bob Hauk: [takes his glasses off and sets them down on his desk] Hauk, Police Commissioner.

Snake Plissken: [thinking] Bob Hauk...

Bob Hauk: Special Forces Unit "Texas Thunder"... we heard of you too, Plissken.

Snake Plissken: [annoyed] Why are we talking?

Bob Hauk: [he opens a drawer on his desk and takes out a certificate; lays the certificate on the desk; stiffly] I have a deal for you. You'll receive full pardon for every criminal action you've committed in the United States. There was an accident. About an hour ago, a small jet went down inside New York City. The President was on board.

Snake Plissken: [bored] The President of what?

Bob Hauk: That's not funny, Plissken. You go in, find the President, bring him out in 24 hours, and you're a free man.

Snake Plissken: 24 hours, huh?

Bob Hauk: I'm making you an offer.

Snake Plissken: Bullshit!

Bob Hauk: Straight, just like I said.

Snake Plissken: I'll think about it.

Bob Hauk: No time. Give me an answer.

Snake Plissken: [looks around the room] Get a new president!

Bob Hauk: We're still at war, Plissken. We need him alive.

Snake Plissken: [directly to Hauk; seriously] I don't give a fuck about your war... or your president.

Bob Hauk: Is that your answer?

Snake Plissken: I'm thinking about it.

Bob Hauk: Think hard.

Snake Plissken: [pause, while he smokes] Why me?

Bob Hauk: You flew the Gullfire over Leningrad. You know how to get in quiet. You're all I got.

Snake Plissken: [pause] I guess I go in one way or the other... doesn't mean shit to me. All right... I'll do it. Give me the pardon paper.

Bob Hauk: When you come out.

Snake Plissken: Before.

Bob Hauk: I told you I wasn't a fool, Plissken.

Snake Plissken: Call me Snake.

Romero: [takes a package out of his shirt and unwraps it to reveal the President's middle finger, complete with ring] You touch me... he dies. If you're not in the air in 30 seconds... he dies. You come back in... he dies. Twenty seconds.

Bob Hauk: I'm ready to talk.

Romero: Nineteen. Eighteen.

Bob Hauk: What do you want?

Romero: Seventeen. Sixteen.

Bob Hauk: [to his soldiers; USPF troops pull out] Let's go. Let's go!

The Duke: [addressing his followers; cheering erupts; more cheering] They sent in their best man, and when we roll across the 69th Street bridge tomorrow, on our way to freedom, we're going to have their best man leading the way - from the neck up! On the hood of my car!

Narrator: In 1988, the crime rate in the United States rises four hundred percent. The once great city of New York becomes the one maximum security prison for the entire country. A 50-foot containment wall is erected along the New Jersey shoreline, across the Harlem River, and down along the Brooklyn shoreline. It completely surrounds Manhattan Island. All bridges and waterways are mined. The United States Police Force, like an army, is encamped around the island. There are no guards inside the prison, only prisoners and the worlds they have made. The rules are simple: once you go in, you don't come out.