Review: Assault on Precinct 13 (2005)

Troubled cop Ethan Hawke, just finishing his psych session with pretty shrink Maria Bello is set to count down the few remaining hours of the current year and of the title precinct, which is to be shut down for good. On duty with him are an old timer inevitably named Jasper O’Shea (Brian Dennehy, playing a character who, also inevitably, is retiring), slightly trashy secretary Drea De Matteo, and when a snowstorm intervenes, even Bello finds herself stuck back at precinct 13. The storm also causes a prison bus carrying a notorious crime lord (Laurence Fishburne, in full magisterial badass mode) to seek refuge at precinct 13. Also on the bus were a trio of lowlife crims played by Aisha Hinds, rapper Ja Rule and inevitably, John Leguizamo (I was looking for M.C. Gainey, Danny Trejo, and Nick Chinlund, but perhaps they were on another prison bus…or plane). Enter a team of heavily-armed corrupt cops (led by Gabriel Byrne, bringing more to his character than is in the script) who are either trying to set Fishburne free, or kill him. A supposedly tense siege begins, whilst Bello starts doing difficult math problems to calm herself down. Matt Craven plays another cop from the precinct.

Disappointingly flat and predictable 2004 Jean-Francois Richet (The pretty decent “Blood Father”, with Mel Gibson) remake of the overrated John Carpenter original (which itself was a modern version of the John Wayne siege flick “Rio Bravo”) has its merits, and in fact I probably liked it a bit better second time around. Although Titus Welliver (as a crim) can’t do a Russian accent for the life of him, the film starts pretty well with Ethan Hawke pretending to be a skittish junkie. He’s convincing and it’s a memorable opener. It’s pretty formulaic after that, though.

Fishburne is dripping with presence and cold-blooded authority here as a crim who clearly sees himself in a higher class than any of the others. He walks off with the whole damn film, and seemingly with ease. Whether it’s magisterial badassery, coolness, weight, authority, charisma, or all of the above the guy owns every bit of the frame by doing nothing except simply being. Maria Bello impresses with short time, whilst underrated veteran character actor Brian Dennehy nearly manages to match Fishburne for weight and presence. Ethan Hawke probably gives one of his better performances too, as a cop who has lost his nerve but better damn well find it again quick. As far as I’m concerned if you’ve seen one Gabriel Byrne performance, you’ve seen them all. He is, however well-cast here in an OK, if unspectacular use of him. Meanwhile, if you want to punch John Leguizamo before the end of his first scene, his performance is clearly working. Perfect casting right there. Ja Rule and Aisha Hinds barely register, though. The film itself is a perfect example of something that is well-shot, without being well-directed. Cinematographer Robert Gantz (who has done a lot of TV) offers up expert lighting, though the shaky-cam isn’t particularly my bag as many of you would know. However, the director has no idea how to keep momentum and tension going, and it results in quite a flat film that is already flooded with clichés (Bad guys who can’t shoot for shit, for one thing). He’s definitely not an action movie director. As much as I would’ve liked more background on Byrne and his cohorts, the thing is that the film would honestly be better if it were shorn of about 10 minutes. So I’d forego the extra character development as well as some of what’s already in the film, for the sake of ratcheting up some real tension. Even “Rio Bravo”, for my money was too long and too slow, despite overall being a better film than this. One thing I did like is that although Fishburne is afforded a little depth to differentiate him from the other three lowlifes, at no point does the script try to sanitise these criminals or paint them in an angelic light. Fishburne is still a murderer and kingpin.

With this cast one expects a whole lot better than a fairly generic siege flick. There’s ultimately nothing much new here and as I say, it’s not been very well-directed. Scripted by James DeMonaco (writer-director of “The Purge”), who probably shares some of the blame for how flat this is, but since he scripted the very tense siege flick “The Negotiator”, I’m gonna go ahead and say most of the problem here is poor direction. Overall, this isn’t bad, it just isn’t terribly good either.

Rating: C