Retro Review: STEELE JUSTICE (1987)

STEELE JUSTICE
(US - 1987)

Written and directed by Robert Boris. Cast: Martin Kove, Sela Ward, Ronny Cox, Bernie Casey, Joseph Campanella, Jan Gan Boyd, Soon-Teck Oh, Sarah Douglas, Shannon Tweed, Robert Kim, Peter Kwong, Al Leong, Phil Fondacaro, Asher Brauner, Dean Ferrandini, Big Bull Bates, Kevin Gage, The Desert Rose Band, Astrid Plane. (R, 97 mins)

In the annals of ridiculous '80s cop movies, STEELE JUSTICE fell through the cracks and still flies under the radar today. An action hero straight out of the McBain playbook, disgraced L.A. cop John Steele is perfectly played in Rainier Wolfcastle-style by a teeth-gritting Martin Kove, then best-known for both his role as Isbecki on the popular CBS series CAGNEY & LACEY and as Kreese, the asshole sensai of the Cobra Kai dojo in the KARATE KID movies. A Vietnam vet-turned-renegade cop who refused to play by the rules, Steele was thrown off the force for insubordination by perpetually irate Chief Bennett (Ronny Cox, basically playing a sniveling "protect the shield" version of his BEVERLY HILLS COP character). Steele, the kind of badass who wears a live coral snake (named Three Steps "because three steps, and you're dead") around his neck, is pulled back into action when his Asian-American ex-partner and Vietnam buddy Minh (Robert Kim) and his family are massacred by the goons of drug kingpin Pham Van Kwan (Peter Kwong), a prominent figure in the "Black Tiger" Vietnamese Mafia. Of course, it goes deeper than that, as Pham is the son of Gen. Bon Soong Kwan (Soon-Teck Oh), a corrupt South Vietnamese military official who was smuggling CIA gold and tried to have Steele killed in the final days of the war. Understandably still holding a grudge, Steele is recruited Shriker-from-DEATH WISH 3-style by Bennett, who wants him take out the trash while keeping the department's image squeaky clean. Or, as Bennett explains to Steele's reluctant new partner Reese (Bernie Casey), "He isn't being recruited...he's being unleashed!" In addition to avenging the death of his best friend, Steele has to contend with clueless, desk-jockey cops and his corrupt former commanding officer Harry (Joseph Campanella) being in cahoots with Kwan, who's now a respected L.A. businessman who's also hooked up with the ambitious, spoiled daughter (Shannon Tweed) of a powerful mafia boss. Any chance all concerned parties will converge at an abandoned factory at a waterfront shipyard? And that a crane will somehow be involved?



There isn't a single cop/action movie cliche that goes unused by writer/director Robert Boris, who also wrote 1973's ELECTRA GLIDE IN BLUE and 1983's DOCTOR DETROIT. The film is filled with stunts and brutal violance but it's silly enough that you have to wonder if Boris was making a comedy. You know there's no way anyone in the cast is taking it seriously. Certainly the actors saw the absurdity of Minh's daughter Cami, the only survivor of the massacre of Minh's family, being played by Jan Gan Boyd. That same year, Boyd played a Secret Service agent who sleeps with Charles Bronson in ASSASSINATION, but here she is in pigtails and dressed like a little girl, skipping around and calling Steele "Uncle John," an actress in her mid 20s playing a role that seems like it was written for a six-year-old. Steele's ex-wife Tracy (Sela Ward) is on hand to humanize him while trying to tell herself she doesn't still love him, admonishing him with "The war isn't over for you...it just changed locations." Of course, there's a "working out/preparing for battle" montage set to a driving, AOR hard rock tune, in this case Hot Pursuit's "Fire with Fire." And it doesn't get any more '80s than the L.A. hotel lobby shootout where Tracy is directing a music video for Animotion ("Obsession") singer Astrid Plane (as herself), when Pham's guys (including perennial '80s henchman Al Leong) show up to kill Cami. Steele and Reese, a budget-conscious Riggs and Murtaugh, arrive only to have Reese barely survive a bullet to the gut and Steele shot with a poisoned dart. That's no problem for Steele, who dives head-first through a window into a banquet room, slices his arm open, sucks out the poison, and cauterizes the wound with a conveniently unattended sizzling pan in one of the greatest scenes ever.