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Assault on Precinct 13 (1976 film)

Assault on Precinct 13
Original theatrical promotional poster, 2nd version. The tagline reads, "A cop with a war on his hands. His enemy... an army of street killers. His only ally... a convicted murderer."
Original theatrical promotional poster, 2nd version
Directed by John Carpenter
Produced by J. S. Kaplan
Written by John Carpenter
Starring Austin Stoker
Darwin Joston
Tony Burton
Laurie Zimmer
Nancy Kyes
Music by John Carpenter
Cinematography Douglas Knapp
Edited by John Carpenter
(as John T. Chance)
Production
company
CKK Corporation
Distributed by
Turtle Releasing (US) Miracle Films (UK)
Release date
  • November 3, 1976 (1976-11-03)
Running time
91 minutes
Country United States
Language English
Budget $100,000
Assault on Precinct 13
Assault on Precinct 13 soundtrack cover, featuring a still from early in the film in which one of the gang lords is sitting in the back seat of a car looking though the scope of a assault rifle.
Soundtrack album by John Carpenter
Released 2003
Recorded 1976
Genre
Length 25:09
Label Record Makers
John Carpenter chronology
Ghosts of Mars
(2001)
Assault on Precinct 13
(2003)
Lost Themes
(2015)

Assault on Precinct 13 is a 1976 American independent action thriller film written, directed, scored and edited by John Carpenter. It stars Austin Stoker as a police officer who defends a defunct precinct against an attack by a relentless criminal gang, along with Darwin Joston as a convicted murderer who helps him. Laurie Zimmer and Tony Burton co-star as other defenders of the precinct.

Writer/director Carpenter was approached by J. Stein Kaplan to make a low-budget exploitation film for under $100,000 but with total creative control. Carpenter wrote The Anderson Alamo, inspired by the Howard Hawks Western film Rio Bravo and the George A. Romero horror film Night of the Living Dead. Despite controversy with the MPAA over the explicitly violent and infamous "ice cream" gunshot scene, the film received an R rating and opened in the United States on November 3, 1976.

Assault was initially met with mixed reviews and unimpressive box-office returns in the United States. However, when the film premiered in the 1977 London Film Festival, it received an ecstatic review by festival director Ken Wlaschin that led to critical acclaim first in Britain and then throughout Europe. It gained a considerable cult following, reappraisal from critics, and was later re-evaluated in America as one of the best action films of its era and of Carpenter's career. A remake appeared in 2005, directed by Jean-François Richet and starring Ethan Hawke and Laurence Fishburne.


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