Air Force One was hijacked and the President (Carpenter mainstay Donald Pleasence) managed to escape in a pod that crash - landed in New York City, where he was promptly abducted by ne'er - do - wells called the Crazies — their name and «
tude owing a debt to George Romero's hostile mutants of the same appellation, though Carpenter, a rebel spirit but not the Sid Vicious kind, seems to attribute their aggression to the spread of punk rather than to a viral contagion.