When I first saw "Scarred City" on late night broadcast TV some years ago, I liked it, despite editing of mammary organs, blood and profanity (It was aired 11.35 p.m., beyond the hold of the dreaded FCC. Aw, the idiocy). Thankfully, I got in on DVD and I like it a bit more. It's not the best, but has charm.
John Trace (Stephen Baldwin) is a good but trigger-happy beat cop in Brooklyn, New York, facing three bad shootings. A fourth happens with a unarmed drug perp. Lt. Laine Devon (Chazz Palminteri) is the only high-level cop sympathetic to Trace's predicament and inducts him into the SCAR unit, an elite group of cops that handle dangerous thugs. It's better than going to jail, but Trace, during a sting at a porn shop, finds Devon and the rest are also trigger-happy, but have no conscience and the powers-that-be look the other way. He goes along for self-protection, but, during a violent drug bust, he breaks rank by saving the life of a call girl/torch song singer named Candy, played by sweet-faced, sassy Tia Carrere. Marked for death by both sides of the law, both of them have to work together to stay a few paces ahead.
"Scarred City" is your usual late-night, B-feature but has much more, thanks to director Ken Sanzel's(writer/showrunner on "Numb3rs") witty dialogue-laded script and the performances. Sure, Baldwin's sometimes sleepy, Carrere's too smart and both look a bit old for the roles, but they play along well as two unlikely lovers who don't fit in their professions, another good redeeming factor. Palminteri comes across more of a mobster than a cop, but still menacing. TV fans should note the appearances of Gary Dourdan (CSI) as Devon's right-hand man and Larry Manetti (Magnum P.I.) as a mob-connected, strip joint owner. The rest of the cast is also reliable.
And no, Tia's doesn't display her "goodies" but there's a funny bit involving that. Although it pales in the shadows of the superior "Magnum Force" and the recent "Frank Miller's Sin City" (particularly the slightly similar "That Yellow Bastard" vignette, starring Bruce Willis, Jessica Alba and Nick Stahl), "Scarred City" is good enough with a six-pack of beer (I prefer orange juice), three extra cheese pizza pies, a soft-core porn film and a Chris Rock concert film on a Saturday night.
