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Demolition Man

In 1996 Los Angeles, psychopathic criminal Simon Phoenix, kidnaps a busload of passengers. Police officer John Spartan, nicknamed "The Demolition Man" for the collateral damage he often causes in apprehending suspects, mounts an unauthorized assault to capture Phoenix. When a thermal scan of the area reveals no trace of the hostages, he raids the building and confronts Phoenix, who sets off explosives to destroy everything. The hostages' corpses are found in the rubble, and Phoenix claims that Spartan knew about them but attacked anyway. Both men are sentenced to lengthy prison terms in the city's "California Cryo-Penitentiary", in which convicts are cryogenically frozen and undergo subliminal rehabilitation techniques.

In 2032, the city of San Angeles – a megalopolis formed from the merger of Los Angeles, San Diego, and Santa Barbara after a massive earthquake – is a seemingly peaceful utopia, designed and run by Dr. Raymond Cocteau. Phoenix is thawed for a parole hearing but escapes using skills he did not have before. Discovering that he can hack into the city's computer network, Phoenix taunts and easily overpowers several police officers who attempt to stop him, to the disbelief of officers watching remotely from their headquarters.

Lieutenant Lenina Huxley, an idealistic officer fascinated by 20th-century culture, learns about Spartan's career from veteran officer Zachary Lamb. He suggests that Spartan is their best chance to stop Phoenix, as someone with the experience and mindset to anticipate his actions. Huxley persuades her superior, Chief George Earle, to parole and reinstate Spartan. Spartan finds life in San Angeles to be sterile and oppressive, since all types of behavior deemed immoral or unhealthy have been declared illegal.

Anticipating that Phoenix will attempt to secure firearms, Spartan has Huxley lead him to a museum, where he finds Phoenix looting a weapons exhibit. Phoenix unexpectedly encounters Cocteau while escaping and aims a gun at him, but involuntarily freezes, unable to kill him. Cocteau orders Phoenix to kill Edgar Friendly, the leader of the Scraps, a resistance society that lives underground. Spartan arrives to find Cocteau unharmed and ponders why Phoenix would spare his life.

In gratitude for being "saved", Cocteau invites Spartan and Huxley to a formal dinner at Taco Bell. Spartan notices the Scraps' approach during the dinner and interrupts their attempt to steal food, but begins to sympathize with them. Acting on a hunch, Spartan has Huxley investigate Phoenix's rehabilitation program and finds that he has been given technological and combat skills to make him even more dangerous than he was in 1996.

During a private meeting, Cocteau expresses his displeasure with Phoenix over the lack of progress in handling Friendly, threatening to return him to the cryo-prison if he fails his mission. Phoenix persuades Cocteau to release additional cryo-prisoners, then leads them underground to assassinate Friendly, only to find Spartan and Huxley already there. They thwart the attempt on Friendly's life, and Phoenix tauntingly reveals to Spartan that he framed him for the deaths of the 1996 hostages; they were dead long before the building exploded. Afterward, as Phoenix escapes to meet Cocteau, Spartan borrows weapons from the Scraps and pursues him.

Pleased with Phoenix's terror campaign, Cocteau boasts of his intention to tighten his control over San Angeles. Unable to kill Cocteau directly himself, Phoenix has a gang member kill him instead, then begins the process of thawing out the cryo-prison's most dangerous convicts. Spartan incapacitates Huxley for her safety, then takes out Phoenix's gang. He battles Phoenix and kills him by freezing him solid then the uncontrolled freezing triggers an explosion that destroys the prison.

The police fear that the loss of the prison and Cocteau's control will end society as they know it. Spartan urges them and the Scraps to work together, combining both the best aspects of order with personal freedom. Huxley and Spartan kiss, then depart together.