"A cartoonish, cheesy and surprisingly campy apocalyptic actioner, “John Carpenter’s Escape From L.A.” is spiked with a number of funny and anarchic ideas, but doesn’t begin to pull them together into a coherent whole. Designed principally to return Kurt Russell’s violence-prone Snake character to the screen after a 15-year layoff and to gain maximum mileage out of the public’s delight in seeing the worst possible fate visited upon SoCal, this serving of sloppy seconds will score its biggest hit with teenage boys. Paramount should look to make a quick getaway with as much B.O. booty as possible from potent openings, as staying power looks meager."