Product Description

When crime on the street gets out of hand, a group of socially prominent men form a vigilante squad. Michael Douglas is chilling.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #24049 in DVD
• Brand: Unknown
• Released on: 2005-02-01
• Rating: R (Restricted)
• Aspect ratio: 1.33:1
• Formats: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, Widescreen, NTSC
• Original language: English
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .20 pounds
• Running time: 109 minutes

Customer Reviews

Judges, Jurors, And Executioners
Michael Douglas portrays an idealistic L.A. County superior court judge who finds himself in a cabal of judges known as THE STAR CHAMBER, in this 1983 film of the same name directed and co-written by Peter Hyams (OUTLAND; CAPRICORN ONE; 2010). His character is frustrated about letting criminals go scot-free on charges ranging from kidnapping to murder because of technicalities; even though the evidence would clearly put these thugs on ice, improper procedures by the police force Douglas to obey the letter of the law and dismiss them.

But he gets a look into this Star Chamber cabal from his mentor (Hal Holbrook, good as ever), where he and seven other judges, plus Douglas now, pass judgment on and later find and execute the criminals. In essence, this Star Chamber consists of judges so fed up with the System that they resort to vigilantism. Douglas, however, doesn't see this particular cabal as the answer, and he has to struggle with this dichotomy.

In a twisted sort of way, this seems like the 1973 Dirty Harry film MAGNUM FORCE as reimagined by John Grisham (though this was years before Grisham was ever widely known). But I think the film, though imperfect in places, makes it clear that a private cabal of judges deciding on the violent punishment of criminals who slip through on technicalities is no better (and realistically far worse) than a flawed prosecution in a real court of law. We may think the justice system is slanted so heavily in favor of the criminals, but that's only because that one day, through some weird twists of fate, we too may find ourselves in the position of the criminals.

Douglas and Holbrook are well-matched here, and Hyams' direction, aided by his co-screenwriter Roderick Taylor, brings out some good points in a somewhat flawed but otherwise well-done courtroom drama that is in need of a revival.

Beware the chamber
As anyone who has ever read Plato's REPUBLIC will tell you, the concept of justice is not nearly so straightforward as we would like to believe. In a perfect world, all the bad guys would go straight to the slammer and all the good guys would be set free and exonerated. We live, of course, in what is far from a perfect world.

There are two extremes to the equation. On the one hand, a police state where you're guilty until proven innocent and deprived of rights that could prove that you are, in fact, guiltless.

On the other hand is a legal system that is so complex that there are thousands of loopholes every step of the way by which clever lawyers may get their client(s) off on a technicality - regardless of how absurd the technicality is.

The present movie asks an intersting question: what if a group of judges got together to do something about the latter situation and correct in-justice? What if, being the incarnation of the "law," they dispensed justice in a manner that was more beneficial to society (or so they hoped)?

This premise leads them into the Star Chamber where they review cases at their leisure. Of course, the obvious question arises: what if they mis-fire? To complicate matters, what if the people they want to whack are guilty of other egregious crimes, but innocent of the crime they've been accused?

Herein lies the premise of THE STAR CHAMBER. It's too bad I waited until just recently to see this movie as I'm a fan of Michael Douglas and Hal Holbrook. But, it was certainly worth the wait. I'll see YOU in court!

A class act
Its been almost 20 years since this movie came out and it has all but been forgotten about. It is one of my all time favorites in that it stretches your thinking from the very opening. As the doctor who's little boy was murdered says to Michael Douglas's character; the judge, "you don't escape so easily", the ideas expressed in the movie cause us all to put ourselves in the shoes of the characters and wonder what would we do? Besides the above, the movie was very entertaining as well. The backround music definately built up the intrigue and Hal Holbrook played his part to a T. As Holbrook said, this project is "a class act". Buy it, you won't be disappointed.