Raw Justice

Before going any further, I may as well make this short and sweet. Raw Justice is awful. In every angle it's cheap and trashy. It is however, hilariously awful and I'd like to recommend it for that very reason.

In the opening scene Mace (David Keith) is out to bust some guy who's just jumped bail. He could have easily have kicked the door open and shown him the gun and the cuffs. But no, this guy doesn't like conventional methods so he decides to "borrow" some clothes from a hooker so he can enter the room as a hooker for reasons unknown. Somehow this genius plan doesn't go smoothly and the bail jumper manages to make a run for it, and what follows is a foot chase with David Keith dressed in drag. Ho ho ho! Funny, right?

Meanwhile, Mitch McCullum (Robert Hays) has just had a one-night stand with the Mayor's daughter. After dropping her off at her home, Deputy Mayor Bob Jenkins (Stacy Keach) orders some hit-man to kill her, not before showing us her rubbing herself repeatedly as she showers nude. After performing the hit and stealing some computer floppy disks, Jenkins decides not to pay him, but rather to kill him instead. Turns out Jenkins is fed up being Deputy, and wants promotion. So in order to live his dream, he decides that killing Mayor David Stiles' (Charles Napier) daughter who was currently writing a book, adding a chapter about incest to her book then threatening Stiles that if he doesn't resign his position as Mayor in his next speech, he'll release the book to the public. Wow! Why did nobody else ever think of a great plan like that before?! The way this movie handles it is even worse. It just doesn't know where to go.

Mayor Stiles hires Mace to investigate, as apparently a loose cannon is exactly what he needs. He meets up with Mitch, the guy who had the one night stand and was initially accused of the murder and the two reluctantly team up and get involved in a couple of shootouts, a crappy car chase, a barfight and a swamp boat chase with hit men and corrupt cops all appearing out of nowhere. As for Pamela Anderson, her character is completely detached from the main plot and the reason for shoehorning her into it is the lamest thing. She plays the hooker whose clothes Mace takes at the start. During the middle of the movie, Mace bumps into her by coincidence and she's angry because he left her outside in her underwear and never returned her clothes. During her whining, bad guys pop up and shoot at our heroes. Now she's been seen with them, she's now part of it and can't be let go.

Yeah, I know...

Just prior to the Mayor's speech, our heroes have just won a barfight. Mace presses corrupt cop Atkins (Leo Rossi) for information as to who he's working for, he gives in and says he's working for Deputy Mayor Bob Jenkins. Mace doesn't even interrogate him for any more information, all he gets is a name before Atkins goes for his gun and is killed, so the only evidence they have against Jenkins is the word of a now deceased cop who our heroes have killed.

So the Mayor's speech has now begun, and if he doesn't resign his position, Jenkins will release the edited book to the public. Instead, he announces that Jenkins is responsible for the murder of his daughter. Jenkins responds by claiming that Stiles had her killed when suddenly our heroes enter the room in and Mace says "I don't think so. Atkins talked". Jenkins then goes insane and takes Stiles hostage. Now, the only evidence they have against Jenkins is one name from a deceased cop who the heroes have killed. What evidence is there that they're even the good guys? Despite his original plan being idiotic, the evidence against Jenkins was minimal so I see no reason at all for him to have taken hostages. He's so unbelievably stupid it's a wonder how he obtained his position as deputy mayor in the first place.

But it gets worse. Jenkins escapes to the roof with his hostage and demands a helicopter. A helicopter appears and after taking off the pilot turns round and it's revealed to be Mace. Yeah, like they're going to give a chopper to some burnt out ex cop. He jumps out into the river and leaves the helicopter with Jenkins to crash into a skyscraper which would not only cause a huge amount of property damage but would seriously endanger innocent civilians both on the ground and in the building. In reality this guy would have been arrested and thrown in jail to rot, here not only does he get off without so much as a slap on the wrist, the mayor has "straightened things out" with him because of this wonderful act of courage!

David Keith is just woeful. Not only does he look awful, but manages to make his character as repulsive and unlikeable as possible. He basically rapes Pamela Anderson's character just after a shootout. Robert Hays is not as bad as Keith but that's not saying much. Reliable B-movie veterans Charles Napier, Stacy Keach and Leo Rossi are wasted. Pamela Anderson has absolutely no reason for being there other than to have two long and boring sex scenes. Her acting is atrocious and her line delivery is at times hilarious, especially in the scene where she tries to comfort Mitch who's feeling sorry for himself by telling him "I think you're being a bit hard on yourself".

Overall, this is awful but I highly recommend anyone who loves bad movies to check it out. I could go on, but I have a minimum of 1000 words! User "bob the moo" took it way too seriously!

Once you have witnessed the scene where Pamela (as a hooker??? how cheesy is that... at least the director knows why we are watching this crap...) gets the job done, you have no more reason to keep watching this atrocity... I put a 3/10 but for a girl or anyone who thinks Pam is ugly, this movie is not even worth that...

I love this film, i dare you to watch it and not laugh at the series of lame gags and poorly co-ordinated action scenes. I didn't think it was possible but this film manages to be both nonsensical and predictable at the same time. Around about this time Pamela Anderson must have been one of the most famous TV actresses around, but as you can see from this, her Film career never really took of, and to be fair her performance here is fairly terrible. The lead character of Mace is your typical loose-cannon angry ex-cop who despises "bleeding-heart judges" and does things his own renegade way. The character of Mitch is a man wanted for murder and completes the intrepid threesome who are the focus of the film, and for some reason our heroes have to run from the baddies chasing them through New Orleans. I have given this film a ranking of nine out of ten because I have watched it three times now and have enjoyed it thoroughly every time. Although in all honesty its not a great film, or even a good film, its by the numbers approach to presenting a cops and robbers action movie complete with lots of unnecessary sex and violence is just fun. I would recommend this film if you want a good laugh at a film that shouldn't really be taken seriously, especially if you find the "McBain" scenes from the Simpsons funny as this film could easily be a Ranier Wolfcastle production.

if you want to see great acting. This is the sort of movie which has an obvious appeal to some. It's not the quality of acting. But if you watched this movie to see fine Shakespearean actors giving their all, then I have no pity for you. The movie is fun on a few levels, but should in no way be taken seriously.

When the daughter of Mayor Stiles is murdered, the chief suspect is a shy young loser who had a date with her that night. The Mayor goes to ex-cop and bounty hunter Mace to make sure Mitch doesn't skip bail, however almost immediately Mitch is set up to commit `suicide'. When Mace is also framed from murder the pair realise that something sinister is going on and they go on the run with hooker Sarah.

Basically this film couldn't have been more see through and obvious if they had dropped the original title and called it `A Chance To See Her T*ts' - for that simply appears to be the entire raison d'etre of the film. The plot is just dumb and never really plays out logically. The characters are lazy cardboard cut outs rather than people and the film has no consistent drama of thrills. The script jumps around all over the place with actions hardly explained and things just happening - it's like the film exists in a world where sense does not exist.

The action scenes are idiotic. The yare like a bad A-Team shoot out with fights that try to be funny and fail - thus damaging the scene in more than one way! Some reviewers have praised the sex scenes and claimed them reason enough to watch the film - sorry, but no. The sex scenes are soft-core topless stuff and are just silly in the places they come. If you are watching a film for sex then go watch a porno, I cannot understand the mentality of someone who will watch a 90 minute `thriller' just because it has 10 minutes of simulated sex in it. I don't encourage porn but lets not encourage people to make more erotic thrillers! The fact that easily spotted errors were left in the film proves how little even the crew cared (look at the helicopter blades at the end, or the open hotel room where Sarah goes to be with Mitch).

The cast are awful, truly awful. Anderson was not the star she is now (?) and the film only uses her body - having her on the posters and all the promotion shows that the film was selling her, not itself. Keith is a joke; he tries to be charismatic but only succeeds in giving a bad impression of much, much better action actors. Hays is best suited to family films and spoofs, he shows that here without a shadow of doubt. He is rubbish, I cannot put it plainer than that; he is rubbish! Anderson has big breasts that look good, but why should I have to suffer her inability to act because of that. Her flat delivery of her lines are in no way compensated for by the fact she gets undressed several times. Napier and Keach are familiar faces but just as bad as they often are.

Overall this is a film that is based on the premise that people would like to see Pamela Anderson naked. This is not a film that cares about characters, logic, plotting, suspense, drama, thrills or action. It is a cold-hearted piece of exploitation and I hate it.