Police Story: Gladiator School

"Police Story" was an exceptional police show from the 1970s. Unlike a traditional cop show, this one had different characters and different sorts of officers and detectives in each show....showing a gamut of different police activities. In the 1980s, a couple "Police Story" made for TV movies appeared....and I assume they were attempts to revive the series which didn't take hold.

Officer Chick Stacy (Robert Conrad) is an old school beat officer. In other words, while he's mostly a good cop, he also has his own may of handling some cases which are NOT by the book. It's bad enough that his partner requests a new partner and he's got a long record of complaints from folks he's arrested stating he used excessive force.

After arresting a really nasty prostitute, the woman alleges that Stacy used excessive force. Soon after, she is drugged and set up in a situation where she appeared to be shooting at Stacy. He returned fire...killing her. But, because it is a set-up, her gun is missing and it appears as if Stacy murdered her!

In addition to following Officer Stacy, the film has a parallel plot--showing the Internal Affairs officers (Anthony LaPaglia and Ed O'Neill) working their various cases...including Stacy's. The pair are unusually sympathetic...unlike the stereotypical IAD cops seen on other shows.



Overall, this is a very good film and it might have been nice to see a series. My only complaint is that there is way too much sax music in the film--so much that it was a bit annoying...but otherwise pretty good.



By the way, this made for TV movie was directed by James Darren. I had no idea he'd directed any shows or movies and perhaps he was chosen since he was a series regular on a cop show, "TJ Hooker". I checked and was surprised at how many TV shows Darren has directed.