As a lifelong horror fanatic, it’s no surprise that I have an undying affinity for John Carpenter’s indelible genre contributions, be it Halloween, The Fog, The Thing, Christine, In the Mouth of Madness, you name it. But let’s not forget how adept Carpenter is at crafting suspenseful action thrillers, seen time and again in movies like Escape from New York, Big Trouble in Little China, They Live, and one soon-to-be 40-year-old cult classic available to watch for free on YouTube.
Released in November 1976, John Carpenter’s Assault on Precinct 13 is a low-budget, independently made, auteur-driven action thriller that, despite being inspired by the classic John Wayne western Rio Bravo, also bears Carpenter’s personal filmmaking stamp. In addition to inspiring a highly underrated 2005 remake, Carpenter’s polarizing assault that nearly earned an X-rating has been reassessed over the years and is roundly considered among Carpenter’s finest works.
‘Assault on Precinct 13′ is a Love Letter to John Wayne & Howard Hawks’ ‘Rio Bravo’
Given $100,000 to make an independent exploitation film without studio interference, John Carpenter wrote, directed, edited, and scored Assault on Precinct 13, completing the film shoot in just 20 days. The movie follows Street Thunder, a vicious Los Angeles gang that storms a defunct, undermanned police precinct in a vow of ultra-bloody vengeance after the LAPD killed six members. Forced to team up with two prisoners locked inside, Highway Patrol officer Ethan Bishop (Austin Stoker) leads the resistance by holding the gang off with gritty guile and punishing firepower.
Writing the screenplay in just eight days, Carpenter initially titled it The Anderson Alamo and credited himself with the alias John T. Chance in early drafts (but not inthe finished film), the name of John Wayne’s character in Rio Bravo. Although he admitted to wanting to make a Hawks-style western in the DVD commentary, the limited budget restricted him from doing so, prompting Carpenter to adopt the basic plot and single-setting scenario in Rio Bravo — in which three men protect the town’s jail from a cutthroat gang of ranchers — and update it with a contemporary setting. According to CrimeReads, the movie clearly channels the classic 1959 western, something Hawks has openly stated countless times.
But more than paying homage to The Duke, Rio Bravo is Carpenter’s unabashed love letter to Howard Hawks, his favorite director who made Rio Bravo and The Thing From Another World, which Carpenter remade as The Thing in 1982. Carpenter also named the character of Leigh (Laurie Zimmer) in Assault on Precinct 13 after Rio Bravo‘s screenwriter, Leigh Brackett. By setting the action in a single location (the precinct) with just a few characters, Carpenter could squeeze the most out of his limited resources and deliver 91 minutes of unrelenting carnage.
40 Years Later, ‘Assault on Precinct 13’ Holds Strong
Although Assault on Precinct 13 adopts the loose plot structure of Rio Bravo, Carpenter’s lean, mean thriller is far more brutal and uncompromisingly grim. As much as I love Rio Bravo, it’s more of a hang-out movie, with its best moments coming as John Wayne, Dean Martin, and Ricky Martin sit around crooning old country tunes. Running 50 minutes shorter than Hawks’ movie, Assault on Precinct 13 doesn’t have excessive downtime to waste. Instead, Carpenter plunges us into violent gang warfare from the get-go and never eases up.
Nearly receiving an X-rating for having the gall to include one of the most disturbing movie taboos on record — violently killing a child onscreen — Assault on Precinct 13 still holds up for Carpenter’s unflinching bravado and less-is-more filmmaking. What he was able to achieve in three weeks, on a shoestring budget, and with no-name actors is truly remarkable. While a bit raw and unvarnished, you can see the talent that would directly lead Carpenter to make Halloween next, the seminal slasher film that cemented his status as an all-world horror maven.
Finally, we’d be remiss not to mention the underrated 2005 remake of Assault on Precinct 13, starring Ethan Hawke and Laurence Fishburne. While not quite as effective as the original, it’s worth finding to see how it also advances the basic Rio Bravo template.
This story originally appeared on Movieweb
