Storyline
Mark Kaminsky is kicked out of the FBI for his rough treatment of a suspect. He winds up as the sheriff of a small town in North Carolina. FBI Chief Harry Shannon, whose son has been killed by a mobster named Patrovina, enlists Kaminsky in a personal vendetta with a promise of reinstatement into the FBI if Patrovina is taken down. To accomplish this, he must go undercover and join Patrovina's gang.
Directors
Cast
Frank Ferrara, Thomas Rosales, Jr., Gary Houston, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Paul Shenar, Robert Davi, George P. Wilbur, Dick Durock, Ed Lauter, Sam Wanamaker, Leon Rippy, Victor Argo, Jack Hallett, Blanche Baker, Norman Max Maxwell, Joe Regalbuto, Steven Hill, Lorenzo Clemons, Darren McGavin, Denver Mattson, Kathryn Harrold, Louise Robey, Mordecai Lawner
Trailer
Reviews
63
Miami Herald
It helps that Raw Deal works, for a time at least, as a first-rate cop movie. It is violent to excess -- more graphic by far than Stallone's films, and bloodier, too -- but it's a real movie. [07 June 1986, p.D1]
60
Though the language is vulgar, the macho posturing absurd and some of the plotting inscrutable, Raw Deal has a kind of seemliness to it. It delivers every punch it promises.
60
John Irvin has a nice eye for irony and for the larger- (and funnier-) than-life trappings of the genre. He doesn't have enormous opportunities to exercise this bent, since Raw Deal is constructed like a serial bomb: It goes off roughly every 12 1/2 minutes, littering the landscape with corpses. But you can detect an adult hand at work here, which could never be said for Cobra's arrogant and inept childishness.
50
Raw Deal is not as reactionary as Cobra but it's just as violent, maybe even bloodier, with its graphic gun fights and bullet-spattered, shattered bodies blasted before our eyes. Still it's also a quality project -- the look and sound of the film are first rate.
50
Washington Post
A mostly tedious, cheaply made shoot-'em-up from the always classy Dino De Laurentiis. [07 June 1986, p.D5]
