With only a few hours left in the calendar year, Precinct 13, one of Detroit's oldest precinct houses, is closing. Amid heavy snowfall and unsafe road conditions, only a few lawmen remain on duty for New Year's Eve. They are headed by Sergeant Jake Roenick, a good cop wrestling with bad memories of a fatal undercover 'op' from the previous spring. Roenick and Precinct 13 have both seen better days.

Early on December 31st, deep in the city, formidable crime lord Marion Bishop, is cornered by an undercover cop. Their ensuing struggle leaves the cop dead and Bishop, captured, by the Organized Crime and Racketeering Squad that Marcus Duvall runs. Bishop is handcuffed and herded onto a prison bus with several criminals: junkie Beck, hustler Smiley, and gang member Anna. But the battering snowstorm stops the bus well short of its high-security destination and strands it at the remote Precinct 13 where, as night falls, the prisoners are temporarily incarcerated.

This influx of prisoners irks Roenick, almost as much as visiting police psychologist Alex Sabian does. But Precinct 13's provocative secretary Iris Ferry and salty veteran cop Jasper "Old School" O'Shea won''t let the increasing workload deter them from celebrating until two masked gunmen break in and attack the guards from the bus. The gunmen are just barely beaten back, and everyone inside Precinct 13 realizes that more will come to extract crime lord Bishop, but also armed and ready to shoot anyone and everyone else.

The cops, looking to the reluctant Roenick for leadership, and the cons, looking to the steely Bishop for an angle, must join forces to live. Fortifying themselves with minimal weaponry and maximum courage, they will not go gently into the bad night. As they fight to the death, the thin lines between good and bad bleed together.

Directed by
Jean-Franois Richet

Cast
Ethan Hawke - Jake Roenick
Laurence Fishburne - Marion Bishop
John Leguizamo - Beck
Maria Bello - Alex Sabian
Jeffrey Atkins (Ja Rule) - Smiley
Drea de Matteo - Iris Ferry
Matt Craven - Capra
Aisha Hinds - Anna
Brian Dennehy - Jasper O'Shea
Gabriel Byrne - Marcus Duvall
Peter Bryant - Lieut. Holloway

Production Co.
Why Not Productions France
Biscayne Pictures
Liaison Films

Produced by
Don Carmody
Joseph Kaufman
Sebastian Lemercier

Studio
Rogue Pictures

Writer
James DeMonaco
John Carpenter

Music
Graeme Revell