Review of The Star Chamber (1983) by Sean C — 18 May 2011

I don't get why Michael Douglas, in the poster for the movie on this website, is holding a gun...he never even comes CLOSE to one, let alone use it. I just think it's quite odd. Anyway, I don't know what is it about this movie but I just didn't get into it at all.

The idea is a pretty fantastic one, but a) They take to long to set up that idea and b) they never really do anything with it. There's three scenes where they're meeting, but each scene is probably a minute long.

Quite frankly, I'd have preferred the entire movie to be just those meetings between them and the discussions that could come of that. I think the problem is, the movie has identity issues, it wants to be legally accurate, it wants to create discussion between the viewers about what they would do and it, somewhat, tries to be an action movie.

There's a completely random, and really quite unnecessary car chase scene just because they COULD. It just doesn't work, some movies can handle different themes and ideas they want to get across (IE: Ghost Dog) and others just can't.

This is one of the movies that can't. It's not a bad movie by any means, it certainly has its moments but for the potential the movie had is completely wasted. Which is why I'm hoping somebody makes a remake, or does a similar type of thing (as this actually happened in real life) because such a story is pretty much perfect for a movie.

In fact, I'm quite surprised more movies haven't done this type of thing, it just seems like a no-brainer. As it stands, it's an ok movie with severe identity issues that just make the movie an underwhelming experience.