Assault on Precinct 13 Movie Review

Assault is not your average action film. It's an action driven, character study chock full of social commentary. Ethan Bishop and Napoleon Wilson (Darwin Joston) are both played by African American actors. This immediately changes the tone of the film. Instead of a film about racial relations, it's broken down to the barest form. Good vs Evil. Or rather the fact that life is not as black and white as "good and evil" everything is perspective.

Everything that made the original charming and thought provoking is thrown out of the remake. Sadly, nothing new or inventive is added. Jean-François Richet's redition of "Assault" plays out like every run of the mill action film.

Ethan Hawke plays Jake Roenick, an officer assigned to a remote Precinct 13 on it's last night in operation, which also happens to be New Year's Eve. Jake, having been injured 8 months earlier in a drug deal gone bad in which he also lost his two partners, hids behind a veil of fake responsiblity, alocohol and painkillers.

Enter Marion Bishop (Laurence Fishburne), a notorious criminal who seems to have his hands in everything. Upon being captured, Bishop is forced to spend two nights in county due to the holiday. But a blinding snowstorm hinders the transport and they are forced to pull over at Precinct 13 to wait out the storm. Now here comes the big change. The new concept that will set this film apart from the orginal....

Bishop has been working with a group of about 30 cops. Cops who now realize they cannot let him live. When a stealth strike on "13," lead by Gabriel Byrne fails. The dirty cops decide that the lives of the eight people trapped in the station are not worth lives of 30 officers. Now, Roenick (Hawke) and his skeleton crew must team up with a rag tag group of criminals lead by Bishop (Fishburne) to fend off the assaulting cops.

Everything else about the film is average. Directing, writing, soundtrack. They all barely register. I firmly believe is the original did not have a cult following this film would never have been made.

My advice...Save your money and rent the original. This new "Assault" has lost all the charisma and social commentary that made the original a cult classic.

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