Slick, implausible, politically compromised thriller. Young trial judge Steve Hardin (Michael Douglas), frustrated with a criminal justice system that allows rapists and murderers to go free, is introduced to the "Star Chamber" by fellow jurist Benjamin Caulfield (Hal Holbrook). It's a
clandestine society of nine judges who have decided to take law and punishment into their own hands. They meet secretly and hire hit men to rub out bad guts freed on "technicalities." Hardin goes along at first, but when he discovers that the Star Chamber has marked two innocent men for death, he
sets out to stop the hired killer and expose the vigilantes. Taut, if occasionally silly...
Released:
1983
Rated:
R
Length:
109 mins