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Code of SilenceRating:
Release Date: 21 November, 2000 Retail Price: $9.98 OUR Price: $9.98 You SAVE: $0.00! Cast: Complete Cast (8 total) |
Code of Silence Reviews
"They Call You 'Stainless Steel' On The Street."
Originally slated for Clint Eastwood who declined it, and definitely one of Chuck Norris' best performances, CODE OF SILENCE concerns Eddie Cusack (Norris), a cop's cop, who finds himself with three sets of enemies---a Colombian drug cartel, the Chicago Mafia, and his fellow cops. The first two are locked in a vicious turf war for control of the drug trade on Chicago's streets, and both sides are gunning for Cusack, who wants to stop them. He soon finds himself trapped in a web of traditional Sicilian "omerta" and Colombian "silencio."
Cusack is a pariah because he has testified against Sgt. Craigie (Ralph Foody), a washed-up alcoholic officer who inadvertently shoots a young boy and plants a gun on the body to cover up his mistake. Although Craigie is known by all to be a dangerous has-been, the code of silence among his brother officers protects him.
The story finally comes down to a stand-off in which the Colombians kidnap the daughter of the Chicago Godfather. Cusack must rescue her. His one-handed fight is one of the best set-piece gun battles on film, certainly the equal of anything in the DIE HARD or LETHAL WEAPON series.
The Cannon Group, a "B" studio, just about breaks into the Hollywood mainstream with this film. The story is strong, the major characters memorable, and the plot dynamic. CODE OF SILENCE is a film which uses it's gritty Chicago locations with an almost Sydney Pollack-like elan. CODE OF SILENCE also foregoes the self-important grimness of the typical "B" action thriller by poking fun at itself. Cusack's off-the-cuff "Catch you later," murmured to a coke dealer as Cusack leaves a tony North Side party to meet with a Mafia chieftain, is a gem; a sequence when two hapless stick-up artists try to rip off a local bar frequented by nothing but cops is a side-splitting classic. Cusack's partner's retirement schemes, everything from selling hot dogs at Wrigley Field to alligator farming, keep the viewer chuckling.
Chuck Norris' performance as Cusack is one of his best characterizations. Norris acts, and so well that he almost makes us forget we are watching Chuck Norris. Henry Silva, as Camacho the Colombian drug lord, is positively frightening. Many of the supporting roles are taken by recognizable mainstream character actors, and these are uniformly good.
The weak spots in CODE OF SILENCE largely involve the scripted dialogue, some of which is overly contrived ("I hate to put you on the spot"..."I spent thirty years on the spot"), and some of the performances, which are wooden and monotone ("Hi, Uncle Felix"..."You've been a bad boy, Tony" a confrontation between two Mafiosi delivered with all the dramatic force of a damp mop on a tile floor). Perhaps these watery moments wouldn't seem so bad if the rest of the film wasn't so well done.
These flaws cost the film a reviewer's star and relegate the film to "B" moviedom, although CODE OF SILENCE really rates an A Minus.
chuck at his butt-kicking best
code of silence is chuck's best role next to lone wolf mcquade and he really does a great job here as a windy city cop who must stop a crime lord and a bloody gang war,and because of the bust gone wrong at the opening of the movie, he does so alone because he knows that an older cop shot a kid and planted a gun on him and at a hearing he says that to a board of review!
more plot than most of chucks movies but it also is action packed! check it out!!!
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