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The Star Chamber is a film that operates under the premise that the legal system has gone awry and it's up to the judges to apply corrective action to the decisions they officially make in court. Interestingly enough Hal Holbrook who came to that conclusion as Lieutenant Briggs in the Dirty Harry film Magnum Force, is now taking a similar position as a judge.
Michael Douglas as a young Superior Court Judge in Los Angeles has reached the same crossroads. After a couple of decisions on procedure that resulted in criminals being cut loose, he starts to question whether the whole criminal justice system is out of whack. That's when Hal Holbrook tells him about a most secret society.
A panel of nine judges have taken it upon themselves to overrule their own rulings. Douglas eagerly joins them, but certain things to go off course for him and he questions whether he's made the right career move.
The cases that Douglas came a cropper on is stuff straight out of the Law and Order episode file. In that series sometimes I think the judge's rulings are somewhat bizarre. Of course in that series it just makes Jack McCoy and his successor try all the harder to win.
It's a nice film, but I do get the feeling that Star Chamber is a Law and Order episode stretched out for a feature film.
score 6/10
bkoganbing 3 March 2008
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1832395/ |
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23-2-2021 18:05:18