Review of Raw Deal (1986) by Matthew J — 30 Dec 2012
Directed by John Irvin (Hamburger Hill (1987), Widow's Peak (1994) and Shiner (2000)), this is a very silly action film made at the peak of it's star powers. Despite some well staged action sequences, it's not aged very well, and it's definitely a product of it's time.
When a mob informant who has information on Chicago mobster Luigi Patrovita (Sam Wanamaker) and the FBI bodyguards protecting him at a remote safe house are ambushed and killed in a violent bloodbath, one of the agents killed is Blair Shannon (Steve Holt), son of FBI Chief Harry Shannon (Darren McGavin), who vows revenge.
However, he's too old to go out on a personal vendetta, so he calls upon former FBI agent and small town Sheriff Mark Kaminsky (Arnold Schwarzenegger) to take down Patrovita and his men. Under the alias of felon Joseph P.
Brenner, Kaminsky is able to work his way into Patrovita's empire, and work his way up the ladder, Yojimbo style to get to Patrovita. It's got a good plot, with the odd flash of action every now and again, but a lot of it is dull, and you can't believe someone like Arnie would be a sheriff.
But, as always, he's good in the action scenes. But it has one or two climactic bits, but on the whole, it fails.
This review of Raw Deal (1986) was written by Matthew J on 30 Dec 2012.
Raw Deal has generally received mixed reviews.
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