Review of Blood on the Badge

Soon after it begins, a viewer will know that this small budgeted movie is of low quality, the opening scenes indicative of what is to come, as Dallas police officer Neil Farrow (David Harrod), along with his partner Bill, hide in a warehouse stocked with weaponry and ammunition, the building soon entered by masked "Libyan terrorists", prompting a gun battle, and as hundreds of automatic weapon rounds dance about them the jolly lawmen joke and laugh as if they hadn't a care. Amazingly, Bill survives being shot several times in the chest by the head "terrorist" and lapses into a coma, but not until he receives Neil's vow that he will "get that guy for you", and Farrow then sets out upon his mission of vengeance, over protests from his supervisor (a wooden Joe Estevez) and, accompanied by an untested female detective from a neighbouring jurisdiction, he goes up against obstacles of all sorts, save those that might reflect cinematic technique, and imagination. There are superfluous subplots and an ample amount of near naked female flesh (Neil is patently irresistible to members of the opposite sex), but through it all an apparition of his comatose partner provides Farrow with not terribly cryptic clues, in addition to Magical Realistic messages of support as a narrative gimmick that gives the vengeful officer sufficient time and opportunity to express various politically correct sentiments while upon his way to discover the identity of Bill's assailant, an unveilment that comes to him somewhat later than it will to all but the most sluggish of viewers. Shot with videotape, the piece has a shoddy look, but more damaging yet is a battery of substandard elements, such as sparse direction, including weak setups and blocking; a screenplay that needs doctoring; scoring that is consistently disruptive; insufficient post-production finishing; and a dearth of logic and continuity. The acting is generally ineffective; however, the lack of able direction and poorly accomplished editing may be held to answer for the stumbling performances of some cast members.