Règlement de comptes

My review was written in July 1983 after a Times Square screening.

Filmed late last year (with an alternate title of "Fierce Encounter", "Deadly Force" is a nondescript imitation of "Dirty Harry" mad by the team responsible for "Vice Squad". Unappealing lead players and a ho-hum script make for a desultory action picture, due for a short life in hit-and-run saturation release.

Episodic format introduces devil-may-care gun-for-hire Stoney Cooper (Wings Hauser, the maniac from "Vice Squad"), juggling New York and Los Angeles assignments. In latter locale, his trackdown of a mass murderer is obstructed by his ex-associate on the police force, Otto Hoxley (Lincoln Kilpatrick), while Cooper fortuitously makes up with his estranged wife Eddie (Joyce Ingalls), at newshen who is also covering the murder case.

Fitting by default in the B-picture category, "Force" lacks the unusual plotting or colorful gallery of characters which once distinguished this form of filmmaking. Key plot twists, particularly the identity of the power behind the killer, are telegraphed so that the audience is at least two reels ahead of the slow-witted leads. Aimed at the action audience, picture features many minority players but casts them in stereotyped roles, except for Lincoln Kilpatrick as the de rigeur tough policeman, making a strong impression in an otherwise undistinguished front line.

As the oversize, toothy lead, Hauser likewise made an impression as the nut terrorizing Season Hubley in "Vice Squad", but the attempt to convert him into a recurring Eastwood-like (or rather a B-level Robert Ginty-like) hero fails. Manhandling lowlifes throughout the film's poorly-knitted episodes. Hauser plays his new role as if wer still essaying a violent maniac, eliciting no sympathy in the process. While in Don Siegel's "Dirty Harry" the hunt and confrontations with killer Andy Robinson were carefully dominant over the episodes of routine Eastwood business, here the mad killer plot has no impact or urgency and differs from the subplots and fille along the way only in terms of body count.

Supporting Hauser in a stock role originally announced for Cindy Pickett, Joyce Ingalls delivers bored, monotone readings. Laying in a noisy musical score fails to ide the unexciting, "let's wrap this one up" nature of Paul Aaron's direction, which loses all credibility in the final reel when Hauser battles the main villain in comic strip "unkillable" scenes. Tech credits are okay.

Deadly Force is an action thriller, but with a twist that I like. I can't believe the bad rap this film has got. This film really has a story to it. At the request of a friend, who's daughter is the latest victim of the X killer, a motiveless madman, who leaves a X marked across the victim's foreheads, ex cop Hauser in top form, returns to his old battleground in L.A. He receives a not so welcoming reception, from some of his old acquaintances, including his ex, a successful news reporter, covering this story. It isn't long before Wings is pushing this guy's buttons, in one thrilling scene he's nearly taken out by this nut, while lazing in a bath. But there appears to be more deadlier forces at play here. We too are a granted a little hot sex scene that Hauser and his better half, starkers, makin' out, amidst the madness. Hauser's character here as a lot of his other characters, is intriguing as it is ambiguous. We want to know more about him. He's a wild card, a good cop thrown off the force before he wouldn't play by the rules. Him and his old black superior, Hoxley, clash many times. After all, next year is an election year. He really has it in for Hauser, even going to the point, of tipping one of his ex con enemies off, whose been promised a split of reward, if he catches this fruitcake. This film has enough action for the serial killer/cop thriller fan and Hauser's screen presence is one great reason to watch this. Remember he did start out on The Young And The Restless. The violence is surprisingly tame, but wit Hauser in the lead, and on the chase, it makes the whole movie worth it. Underrated. A compelling watch.

A customarily vanilla, but rather violent and tawdry action thriller joint with a colourfully explosive Wings Hauser performance as an ex-cop returning to Los Angeles to find the serial killer that murdered his friends' granddaughter. He's a rogue who believes the system doesn't work and would go about any way to get the job done ("Your crazy man!"). Because of this, he's not welcome by the local authorities, then there's the ex-wife and also the local criminals who he had a past with when he was a LA cop.

There's no surprises here, but it's well made in workman-like manner by director Paul Aaron ("A Force of One"). Fundamental is how you can describe the b-grade story, but it did somewhat change route in the back-end after what I thought was going to be your typical stalk and slash outing with a (ex-maverick) cop after a psycho serial killer. In away I probably would have preferred if stuck to that formula (something similar to Charles Bronson's "10 to Midnight"), then where it actually headed. Even the added love-interest with Joyce Ingalls's character felt like nothing more than padding. The narrative does have a scattered pattern going on, but everything is thinly examined when it comes to its finale. Pacing can be very uneven, but the action is physically tough and breakneck (as well as that pumping soundtrack)… but you end up wishing there were more extreme dynamics than what's produced. Also showing up in the cast is Paul Shenar, Al Ruscio, Lincoln Kilpatrick and Arlen Dean Snyder.

Middle-of-the-road entertainment.

"You leave L.A, I'll have your ass!"

"Deadly Force" has everything you would expect from a cop kicked off the force film, and that is the problem. Wings Hauser is the renegade cop investigating a series of apparently random homicides, committed by perhaps the least developed, and least interesting villain in screen history. The overly simplistic story really has nowhere to go, so it is well padded with gratuitous car chases and explosions. I will say however, this is the first time I have seen the game of "rat roulette" played, and it looks more interesting than the rest of "Deadly Force". This strictly by the book action film might be worth a look for Wings Hauser fans but others beware. - MERK

This movie drags terribly. I checked the time and couldn't believe I was only 38 minutes in and that there was over an hour left. Slow moving and thats more down to plot and the lengthy character development of Stoney Cooper. That didn't help.

The plot is good standard fare for an action movie. Ex cop turned private detective returns to LA where formerly served to solve the murder of a friend's daughter. He meets up with old enemies and his ex wife while things dont go as planned. The movie would have worked with a good healthy edit and better action sequences like the last one which didn't make sense. Alot of gloating to prolong it too long.

Might have been alot better with a good edit. Wings Hauser was good in the role. Also nice seeing Al Ruscio not playing the stereotypical bad guy for a change.