Turns out the forces surrounding the station are not quite who they seem, ratcheting up the level of interest and danger, and providing Gabriel Byrne with one of his thankless roles in which he is hard, taciturn, and one-dimensional enough to qualify for Flatland.

It's up to Jake to pull himself together and command the defense of the surrounded station he can't call for help because the phones, cell phones and radios are all conveniently inoperable - all because of the Dark and Stormy, etc., I think. It's New Year's Eve, a Dark and Stormy Night, the highway is blocked by an accident, the officers on the bus decide to dump the prisoners at Precinct 13, and then things get dicey when it appears that Bishop's men are determined to break him free. An ubercriminal named Bishop ( Laurence Fishburne) has been arrested and is being transported by police bus with some other detainees, including the motormouth Beck ( John Leguizamo), a crew-cut girl crook ( Aisha Hinds) and a counterfeiter named Smiley (Jeffrey Atkins, a k a Ja Rule). There's basically nothing for them to do except for Jake to pop some more pain-killers and chase them with booze from the office bottle. Also in the station is the buxom secretary Iris ( Drea de Matteo). Burnt-out desk sergeant Jake Fornick ( Ethan Hawke), still traumatized by the death of two partners, is on the graveyard shift with old-timer Jasper O'Shea ( Brian Dennehy), who in a revelation fraught with omens, announces he will soon retire. Precinct 13, in this version, is scheduled to close forever at midnight.

The Forgotten by Wendy Beck