It's reassuring to see James Woods in a film tailored to his own kinetic acting style, portraying a reckless liberal lawyer whose last line of defense against the Establishment is a cool, counter-culture pony tail and a client list loaded with drug offenders he can acquit on legal technicalities. Prompted by his (predictably) straight-laced protégé (Robert Downey, Jr., who off-screen at the time could have used the services of just such a lawyer), Woods reluctantly begins investigating an eight-year old Chinatown gangland assassination, putting his reputation, his integrity, and finally his life in jeopardy by attempting to clear the already convicted (but possibly innocent) defendant against a battery of airtight, incriminating evidence.
The mystery itself is cleverly set up, the solution is both credible and genuinely surprising, and the supporting characters are sketched in with caustic wit and plenty of (generally off-gray) color. The result is a gritty and diverting thriller hampered only by the clichés of its late-1980s visual vocabulary, and by a lack of any greater ambition, which might have given the story more resonance. By all means enjoy it while it's on the screen, but don't expect the memory to linger too long afterward.
The mystery itself is cleverly set up, the solution is both credible and genuinely surprising, and the supporting characters are sketched in with caustic wit and plenty of (generally off-gray) color. The result is a gritty and diverting thriller hampered only by the clichés of its late-1980s visual vocabulary, and by a lack of any greater ambition, which might have given the story more resonance. By all means enjoy it while it's on the screen, but don't expect the memory to linger too long afterward.