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Escape from New York

1981 · directed by John Carpenter · 99 min
24,523 feet · Prominence
646th of 24,106 films scored
The Rewatchables‘Escape From New York’ With Bill Simmons, Shea Serrano, and Chris Ryan →

How this film scores

Draw60

Lifetime worldwide gross $50m, re-releases included; about $182m in 2026 money.

Rank1,864 of 11,051In 198113 of 90

How Draw works

Inflation-adjusted worldwide box office, on one global curve, and nothing else. It does not know whether a film was good.

Praise73

Awards claim half the headroom above the critics' score.

Critics73 baseAwards0 signal → +0 lift

No award rows on file, usually missing data rather than missing honours. Wikidata is thin for older and non-English films.

How Praise works

Critics set the score; a tiered award record, Picture and Directing carrying the most weight, claims half the headroom above it. Praise is the verdict at the time; Legacy is the verdict since.

Legacy62

Judged directly: Snake Plissken icon, Carpenter cult staple.

Verdict62 of 100IMDb7.1 from 171kWikipedia39k views a monthAge45 years

Scored beside it · 508 of 4,039 films judged

If it does not belong in this company, the number is wrong.

How Legacy works

Legacy is a judgment, not a formula. A film can be adored by critics and culturally quiet, or lightly reviewed and permanently lodged in the culture, and no arithmetic over IMDb numbers tells the difference. Every signal behind it keeps updating.

draw 60 praise 73 legacy 62averages 65, placing it at24,523 ft
How the three become one number

Added, not multiplied, so a film transcendent on one pillar and weak on another is not zeroed out. A compression curve then squeezes the top, because the seven greatest films ever made should not be four thousand feet apart.

Whose apex this is

▲ Kurt Russell

In these careers — elevation for this film

Kurt Russell20,265 ftLee Van Cleef18,539 ftDonald Pleasence18,518 ftHarry Dean Stanton18,372 ftErnest Borgnine18,330 ftIsaac Hayes18,088 ftRodger Bumpass17,629 ftGeorge Buck Flower17,625 ft