Plot: What’s it about?
The story opens up when an undercover cop (Bret Michaels – Ex-lead singer of the 80’s hair band “Poison”) is murdered after his cover is blown by a group of vicious drug dealers consisting of (Joe Lando of “Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman”), (Courtney Gains, “Malachai” from “Children Of The Corn.”), (Tina Nguyen) & (Bruce Nelson). Captain Bill Peterson (Martin Sheen of TV’s “The West Wing” & the films “Wallstreet” & “The Dead Zone”) is investigating this murder being that the dead officer was one of his own men from the department. Local D. E. A. officer John Bagwell (Paul Gleason of “The Breakfast Club” & “Die Hard”) is also investigating the case and provides Peterson with information of drug traffickers bringing about 50 million worth of heroin into Los Angeles from Mexico. He wants the shipment to arrive unmolested so as to find ou! t ! who the US connection is. Peterson agrees with this only if he can be part of the operation. Meanwhile, Peterson’s son Jake (Charlie Sheen of TV’s “Spin City” and the films “Platoon” & Wallstreet.) is also a cop and is working in the evidence room instead of vice at his wife’s (Meredith Salenger of “Lake Placid”) request (because its safer). However, he is still having problems with her because he is devoted to his job and she feels that he doesn’t spend enough time with her and their daughter. Jake visits with his ex-partner Paul Delucca (Mark Dacascos of “The Crow” TV series and the films “Drive” & “Boogie Boy”) who is staking out a hotel where his new female partner in vice is working undercover as a hooker. One of her potential clients by chance happens to be one of the four drug dealers (Gains) I mentioned earlier. Bill Peterson and Bagwell are staking out a drug deal involving the other three dealers and their! M! exico connection. Peterson & Bagwell follow the three and hope to make a bust when they drop of the heroin to their boss. They end up following them back to the same hotel where (Gains) is. The female cop has her cover blown and all hell breaks loose. However, the dealers are able to get away with the heroin. Jake finds out about his father’s secret operation with Bagwell and wants to be involved as well as Delucca. The pursuit is on to find the heroin and all players involved, as there are some other mystery guests involved in this as well. Could they be crooked cops or city officials?
“No Code Of Conduct” was directed by Bret Michaels (“Poison”) who also wrote the screenplay with Charlie Sheen and shared executive producer duties with him too. Michaels also directed another film called “A Letter From Death Row” which he starred in with Charlie & Martin Sheen. As for “No Code Of Conduct,” it was an average film at best. It is not the type of film you would expect Charlie and Martin Sheen to appear in considering that they were both together in “Wallstreet.” This is definitely a few steps down in budget & quality from that film. This is definitely a “B” movie as it premiered on the USA Network in a cut “PG” like version earlier in the year. It is the type of movie that would have premiered on HBO’s guilty pleasure lineup or direct to video if USA didn’t pick it up. It’s a low budget action! f! ilm you watch when your channel surfing at home and come across by chance (Which isn’t always a bad thing as I like these types of films as long as they deliver). This one does an all right job at that as there is a good chase scene thrown in here (which is the best scene in the movie). The other scenes are all right but you can tell that they have the “B” movie look to them and are not on par with John Woo Movies or some of the other bigger action films. It plays at the level of the rest of the other direct to video/HBO guilty pleasure films and doesn’t stand out in front of the others, except in the casting department. There are some known faces here in Charlie & Martin Sheen, Mark Dacascos, (who has become a direct to video regular) Paul Gleason, (Who most will recognize but probably can’t put a name with him), and the same goes with Joe Lando who played “Sulley” on “Dr. Quinn Medicine Woman.” They all do a decent job with their parts considering that the script is filled with some silly dialogue and cliched scenarios. However, some other actors don’t perform as well in this and are pretty lousy. Despite these things, I still found the film watchable and might give it another look because of Charlie & Martin Sheen’s presence in the film.
Dimension (Buena Vista) is behind this DVD release which is overpriced (Retail $32.99 or as low as $23 -$26 at Best Buy/Circuit City/DVD Planet/DVD Express) and (as no surprise to me) basically has no features unless you count the two trailers that appear on screen before arriving to the main menu (which you can’t even access from there if you want to watch them again). This type of disk should be in the price range of Warner Bros. titles like “The In Crowd” & “Battlefield Earth” which are both retailed at $19.99 and offer an array of supplements. The $32.99 price should go with some super-duper special edition that is a two or three disk set. The fact that this is a low budget direct to video film would be another reason to offer at a low price because a lot of people aren’t as aware of this title as some of the bigger theatric! al! titles and not as many people would be inclined to shell out a lot of money for this disk like they would for “Titanic” of “The Perfect Storm.” Hopefully Buena Vista could create a pricing system similar to Warner Bros. or MGM.
Video: How does it look?
The picture is presented in the 1.85:1 ratio and is enhanced for 16×9 televisions. The color levels are a little too bright in some scenes but not too bad. However, the bigger problem is grain which appears throughout most of the film. It isn’t terrible and unwatchable but it is clearly noticeable. Other than that the picture contrast and black levels looks fine and I imagine that this looks much better than the video cassette release. Considering that this a higher priced disk and is a newer movie, it should look better than this.
Audio: How does it sound?
The audio is better which is a 5.1 surround track and is actually decent mix. There is a good balance between the dialogue and the sound effects/music and dialogue is never drowned out. The bass and rear channels get some use during the action scenes with a few explosions and some gunfire. The rest of the time the rear speakers get a little usage on and off but not like the action scenes.
Supplements: What are the extras?
Like I said before there is nothing really here but two trailers (One for “Reindeer Games” & the other for Jet Li’s “The Defender”) which appear on screen before you go to the main menu (You can skip them) but you can’t access them from the menu screen. You have to turn your player off and start the disk again in order the see the trailers. It would have been nice to at least get a movie trailer for “Code Of Conduct” a short featurette, deleted scenes, or a commentary track with the Sheen’s considering the high price, but no dice.
I wouldn’t strongly recommend this for a purchase because it is not good enough movie to pay $23-$33 and there are no real extras on this disk. (Unless you are a diehard Sheen fan and can find a used copy of it at a lower price.) If you like direct to cable/video “B” action movies and aren’t picky with and just flipping through the channels or at your local video store you might want to give this a look considering that this has a good leading cast for a low budget movie.
