"Movies like this depend on w:visual effects, costumes and set design to create their worlds out of scratch, and “Escape From L.A.” is wall-to-wall with the landmarks of a post-earthquake L.A. We see the Chinese theater, the Hollywood Bowl and a beached ocean liner, and the showdown takes place in an amusement park intended, I think, to suggest Disneyland's Main Street USA. Snake finds his way through the deadly wilderness with a series of guides, including Pipeline (Peter Fonda), a has-been surfer; Taslima (Valeria Golino), a beautiful but doomed street person; Map-to-the-Stars Eddie (Steve Buscemi), who is the “guy to see” about anything, and the exotic Hershe (Pam Grier), a transsexual who once befriended Snake back in Cleveland, where he/she was known as Carjack."