Thanks for the memories!

Plenty to Like, Plenty to Dislike

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

An old-fashioned movie made with new-fashioned finesse.

This is a great movie. It is very scary. It has also has a great story line. It also has great acting. It is scarier then The silences of the lambs could ever be. It is a great horror movie.

With Maniac Cop 2, director William Lustig and screenwriter Larry Cohen imagined a mixture of bloody slasher and crime thriller The French Connection, and delivered just about the most satisfying sequel imaginable to an original that was hardly great. It delivered on car chases, action set-pieces and slasher mayhem, backed with a witty, sharp script and an impressive cast. It also delivered a full-body- burn climax that was as exciting as it was technically impressive. While part two looked at William Friedkin's classic thriller for inspiration, just where Maniac Cop 3: Badge of Silence found inspiration is anyone's guess, other than perhaps the sort of drivel you used to find buried on the bottom shelf of the video store. Lustig and Cohen have both disowned the movie since its release, and it isn't difficult to see why.Citing studio interference, Lustig walked from the set half-way through filming for the movie to be picked up by inexperienced producer Joel Soisson, who is uncredited. The resulting film is less than a half-baked idea: a lumbering mess of a film, primarily made up of filler that is, at times, downright unwatchable. Having clear Matt Cordell's name and buried him with honours in tact, Detective Sean McKinney (Robert Davi) had hoped to have seen the last of the 'Maniac Cop'. His close father-daughter-like relationship with young police officer Katie Sullivan (Gretchen Becker) is ground to a halt when she is gunned down and placed into a coma by junkie Frank (Jackie Earle Haley), only for two 'nightcrawler' cameramen to smear her name with some edited footage. After being resurrected by a Voodoo priest, Cordell sees Sullivan as an equally tortured and unfairly disgraced soul, and sets about claiming her for his own.It's hard to know where to start with Maniac Cop 3, as the film is so lacking in ideas and structure that it barely has a beginning, middle and end. When it hits a wall, it looks to its predecessor for ideas. So we are treated to another convenience store shootout, another high speed chase, and another finale involving a full body burn. In its defence, the climax mixes both a high speed chase and a full body burn, and while it goes on for a little too long, you have to appreciate the complexity of such an intricate set-piece. Cordell, again played by Robert Z'Dar, is relegated to little more than a glorified cameo in his own movie, appearing ever now and then to carry out a bloody deed seemingly for Voodoo priest Houngan (Julius Harris), whose motives are still unclear when the credits roll. As a fan of the first two Maniac Cop movies, it's easy to feel as cheated as Lustig did as he stormed off set.

Compared to the first two movies, this one is certainly a bit of a disappointment. It's not as fun and also not as action packed as any of the two previous movies. Perhaps the fact that director William Lustig walked off the set, for some reason, is the reason for this.You can tell that this movie had some really good ideas in it but it just doesn't work out quite well enough all.It sounds strange but even Cordell just comes across as a totally pointless character in this movie, even though he is the titular maniac cop of the movie. Seems like the movie really had a hard time putting its emphasis on the right elements and persons within this movie. It was true that in the previous movie the Robert Davi got pushed to the background too much, even though he was supposed to be the main hero of the movie. This time its perhaps more the other way around, with the movie focusing more on the 'human' characters and not the evil villainous Matt Cordell. it makes everything that he does in this movie come across as just silly and pointless. No, the movie just doesn't work out that very well.But the thing that was perhaps still missing most from this movie was the fact that it just didn't managed to become fun or entertaining to watch. Of course all of the previous Maniac Cop movies are silly ones but at least the know to be fun and don't become ever very serious and instead goes more often over-the-top.Oh well, it at least still has Robert Davi and Jackie Earle Haley in it, who still keep the movie somewhat interesting and fun to watch, avoiding it from becoming a completely unwatchable one.Not hard to see why they decided on leaving the series at 3 movies.5/10http://bobafett1138.blogspot.com/

The first Maniac Cop film is one of the supreme trash classics from the eighties; and its sequel, the imaginatively titled 'Maniac Cop 2' is about as good as a sequel could have been. However, in true sequel fashion; this third outing is extremely poor. The film is subtitled 'Badge of Silence', but 'Bride of Maniac Cop' would be more appropriate, since that's the road that the second sequel has chosen to go down. Once again, we have William Lustig directing a script written by Larry Cohen; this team worked so well on the first two films, but something hasn't clicked this time around. The entire movie feels like it cant really be bothered, with the plot serving only in dishing up the relevant elements for Matt Cordell; the 'maniac cop' to go on another killing spree. We see a voodoo priest resurrect the mental copper shortly before witnessing police officer Kate Sullivan gets killed during an armed robbery. For some, largely unexplained, reason; Matt Cordell decides that he wants to make Kate his bride. It's not long before Sean McKinney (the hard-bitten detective from Maniac Cop 2) begins to suspect that Cordell may be back on the scene.One of the main problems with this film is the scenes with the maniac cop. There aren't enough of them for a start, and the ones there are merely show him powering his way through people, and this fails to capture the creepiness of the original. Robert Z'Dar is still imposing in the only role that his name is associated with; but his presence was much better handled in the previous two films. I quite like Robert Davi; he's no Bruce Campbell or Tom Atkins, but he looks the part as the experienced policeman, and definitely fits this sort of film well. The atmosphere is well created again, with a foreboding New York feel accompanying most of the street scenes; which is a shame since most of the film takes place in a hospital. The police force itself isn't portrayed very well, and there isn't a single scene that is really convincing. The film has a very direct to video feel throughout also, and no attempt is ever made to mask the fact that you're watching a worthless piece of crap. The violence is fairly heavy, although there isn't a lot of blood; and the final car chase goes on far too long, and manages to drain the last bit of energy from an already frail film. If you loved the first two, you might find something here. But then again, you might not. Skip it.