Badge of Silence: Maniac Cop III

“At least he died with a smile on his face.”

“I’m praying to the news gods for one good misfortune.”

Santeria is used by a priest, invoking incantations that resurrect Cordell from the dead. Jackie Earl Haley, of all people, packs a shotgun and dares police to enter a convenience store, blowing away anybody who steps in with the heat he’s packing. “Maniac Kate”, the nickname for badass police woman, Kate Sullivan (Gretchen Becker), tries herself to take Haley’s psychotic, gut-toting thug (named Frank Jessup) down, with the expected tragic results. Jessup appears to have taken the pharmacy counter girl hostage while surfing through cabinets to find drugs, with Kate going through a window above. She takes him out but is startled by the pharmacy girl who reveals herself to be Jessup’s squeeze, with both shooting each other. Kate doesn’t survive. What does all this have to do with Cordell? He wants Kate resurrected to be his undead bride!!! The smooth customer, Robert Davi, returns from Part 2, alarmed that Kate is on the verge of death, had cleared Cordell’s name but the spirit of the Maniac Cop will never be at rest. The ultimate tragedy is that Kate’s own name is devalued and disrespected thanks to a news crew who shot footage of the gunfight in a demeaning fashion that made it look like the pharmacy girl was a collateral damage due to a cop out of control. Cordell understands what that is like—being framed and dishonored—and will take his pound of flesh. Ridiculously, despite three hollow round shots to the torso, Jessup survives and says he won’t file a case against the police force if there’s no time served. Well Davi’s Sean McKinney wants Kate’s name cleared, and pays Jessup a visit.

The series went into the Zombie Jason territory, turning Cordell into a walking undead monster with superhuman strength and rotted visage. Kate’s disregard spurns Cordell’s rage. A surgeon who considers Kate a waste of a bed, just avoiding even trying to see if her condition was at all better (McKinney is holding her hand when Kate has a horrifying nightmare where she was marrying Undead Cordell, momentarily awakening with eyes wide open with fright). This surgeon (Doug Savant; later of Desperate Housewives) is making out with a nurse when he hears a noise, looks outside, and is surprised by Cordell, equipped with a defibrillator, using the shock paddles to give the prick a good jolt. Following him up to the roof, Cordell lifts the guy off his feet by placing the two shock paddles on his face, with the camera showing his legs tremor! One of those absurd scenes with the question of just how Cordell would know which surgeon works on Kate considering he’s not in the hospital during the day. It seems Cordell uses the tunnels below the hospital to travel to and fro. There’s a church used for the practice of Santeria...McKinney uses his investigative skills to find it.

Robert Forster, before QT gave him the best role of his career (along with Medium Cool) in Jackie Brown, was pocketing cash in low budget B-movies. He worked with Lustig on Vigilante (1983) and Uncle Sam (1996). Here, he makes one scene perhaps the best of the entire film. He’s the doc of renown, walking through an ER as nurses and physicians tend to patients, making wise-cracks while discussing Kate’s condition with a  sleazy spokesman for the police department (Paul Gleason of “The Breakfast Club”). Gleason wants Kate cut off life support while Forster is willing to comply since a signed permission to do so was signed by her mother. Forster wants some Knicks tickets for some friends coming in town! Well, Forster gives his few minutes, encounters Cordell, is buckled into a gurney, and has an X-ray machine radiating his face! Gleason is walking with Haley’s lawyer as the two get into an elevator and discuss some privileges for her client as long as he complies with not suing the department. Both are gunned down when Cordell unlocks Haley from his gurney and allows him to have a gun!

“I just shot my lawyer.” - Jessup

“Get another one. They’re free.” – fellow prisoner in a bed and handcuffs set free.

Jessup doesn’t last much longer, though, as McKinney surprises him and two other prisoners (who were locked to the handles of their beds), under a sheet on a gurney, pretending to be a dead body! Guns blazing, with Jessup narrowly fleeing to a woman’s bathroom, he’ll not escape the stall behind a woman on the toilet.

Cordell takes off Kate’s body and McKinney is in pursuit.  The priest tries to conjure Kate’s soul to inhabit her undead body but she won’t allow it, with Cordell pissed, shotgun in hand, deciding that he’s of no more use. A fire escalates thanks to candles, flaming Kate’s body with Cordell, defying the inevitable, trying to take her away to no avail.

The pretty, leggy blond Caitlin Dulaney is a doctor McKinney meets in the hospital while visiting Kate. She initiates herself into the situation, seeing first hand (albeit briefly) Undead Cordell. McKinney and Caitlin fall in love. While in a paramedic wagon, Cordell arrives beside them in a cop car while on fire! This is a rather phenomenal stunt considering the stuntman is in make-up, on fire, and driving the car! It goes on for a spell, too, concluding the film. It ends with a sweet explosion.

Z’Dar’s final Maniac Cop but the guy never stopped working until his end. Davi lighting a cig with the burning hand from one of Cordell’s severed arms was quite gnarly.

Certainly a stupid movie, but I had enough fun with it. A far distant cry from Maniac Cop and the impressive sequel. The final shot with one crispy hand reaching for another is quite the punctuation mark on the series.