SPOILER WARNING, MAJOR SPOILERS AHEAD
This is a very loose 2005 remake of John Carpenter's classic “Assault on Precinct 13”. In the new version, the isolated police station is attacked by rogue cops who want to eliminate a potentially dangerous witness, the arrested gangster Marion Bishop. Of course, they have to kill everyone else, too, to cover their tracks. The officer in charge of the precinct, Jake Roenick, is a psychiatric basket case. He is forced to seek Bishop's help against the intruders. Roenick's shrink, a secretary, a motley assortment of petty criminals and a few good cops volunteer to help. Together, this unlikely band of brothers and sisters manage to fend off the attackers, give or take a few plot twists.
I admit that I liked “Assault on Precinct 13”. I don't usually watch action/cop films of this sort, but there was something appealing about the idea of a broad underdog alliance taking on the bad guys who (surprise) turn out to be establishment figures. In the original version, the attackers were gang members á la underclass. It would be interesting to speculate about why the two versions are so different on this crucial point...
Marion Bishop is starred by Laurence Fishburne from “The Matrix”. Perhaps I'm only imagining things, but some of the scenes did remind me of “The Matrix”. Even the music sounds Matrix-like at one point. An in-house nod to fans of red pills?
Four stars for the entertainment and the slight whiff of Matrix revolutions!
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