Just Cause

Plot synopsis:
Paul Armstrong (Sean Connery), a liberal Harvard professor opposed to capital punishment, is persuaded to go to Florida to investigate the conviction of Bobby Earl Ferguson (Blair Underwood) for murder. Ferguson, a former Cornell University student, who was convicted of raping and murdering a young white girl named Joanie Shriver (Barbara Jean Kane). Armstrong must save him from being executed in the electric chair. Ferguson tells Armstrong that he was tortured by two police detectives to get a confession. As Armstrong digs deeper into the case, he discovers that Tanny Brown (Laurence Fishburne), the chief detective on the case, did indeed coerce Ferguson's confession.
The plot thickens when Ferguson tells the professor that the murder was actually committed by Blair Sullivan (Ed Harris), a serial killer awaiting execution, who later reveals the location of the weapon used to kill the girl. When Armstrong discovers the weapon, Brown tries to threaten him into abandoning the investigation. (It is revealed that the murdered girl was Brown's daughter's best friend.) Ferguson gets a re-trial and is freed from prison. Subsequently, the governor signs Sullivan's death warrant.
Armstrong receives a call from Sullivan, who says he has a final clue to share, but first wants Armstrong to visit his (Sullivan's) parents and tell them he said goodbye. Armstrong is shocked to find their butchered bodies. Back at the prison, Sullivan gloats that he and Ferguson struck a deal: Ferguson would kill Sullivan's parents in exchange for freedom, while Sullivan would claim responsibility for the girl's murder, which Ferguson did in fact commit. Armstrong asks why he was needed for their scheme, and Sullivan replies that was "Bobby Earl's call." Armstrong has the last laugh by lying to Sullivan that his parents were alive and that they "forgive him." Sullivan becomes enraged. He resists the guards taking him to the electric chair, where he is executed.
Armstrong and Brown go after Ferguson, whose motive for everything turns out to be a desire for revenge on Armstrong's wife (Kate Capshaw); she was the prosecutor against him in a previous rape trial which, while thrown out of court on a technicality, resulted in him being brutalized and castrated in jail, as well as being kicked out of Cornell, robbing him of any chance of a future. Ferguson plans to murder Armstrong's wife and daughter (Scarlett Johansson) and then disappear. Armstrong and Brown join forces to kill Ferguson and save Armstrong's family.

Tags: revenge, neo noir, murder

Review:
Just Cause takes some of the best parts of three films, Cape Fear, A Touch of Evil and Silence of the Lambs and mixes it together to come up with a good thriller of a film.Sean Connery is a liberal law professor, married to a former Assistant District Attorney, Kate Capshaw and he's a crusader against capital punishment.
He's sitting on death row for the murder of a young girl.When Connery arrives in this rural Florida county he's up against a tough sheriff played by Laurence Fishburne who's about as ruthless in his crime solving as Orson Welles was in Touch of Evil.
Responding to a plea, Armstrong comes out of semi-retirement and travels to Florida to help the young, black death row prisoner Bobby Earl Ferguson, who claims he has been falsely convicted of murder.
Upon investigating Bobby Earl's case, Armstrong soon discovers several grave discrepancies, to the dismay of the local police officer, Tanny Brown (played by Laurence Fishburne).
There are several plot twists which surprise the audience (one of them includes Armstrong's young wife and her past), and towards the end of the film, the action really starts to set in, and Armstrong's own convictions are tested as he finds his family in the hands of a mad killer.
It is nicely photographed, with several scenes from the damp, alligator-filled swamps surrounding the little Florida town.Sean Connery is reliable as the stout, solid professor Armstrong, and as the centerpiece of the movie, he is totally convincing.
Compared to another movie psycho, the deliciously evil Hannibal Lecter, Harris' Sullivan is simply annoying."Just Cause" doesn't offer anything radically new in this movie genre, but it is a solid, mostly well-acted film who should deliver enough thrills and excitement to satisfy most viewers.
Still I regard "Just Cause" as an above average thriller simply because of the fine cast.Maybe Sean Connery was miscast in his role.
But he of course is helped by a very solid supporting cast that consists out of actors like Laurence Fishburne, Blair Underwood, Ned Beatty, Hope Lange, Lynne Thigpen and Ed Harris.
I was left feeling surprised that Connery, Harris, Fishburn and Capshaw had anything to do with this turkey, individually or collectively.The film up until the final thirty minutes was rather engaging and I like the way the story was unfolding and the nature of the film overall.
What's worse is that, once the twist was revealed, the remainder of the film became excruciatingly predictable.Harris gave a terrific performance and Connery is like Morgan Freeman in that he never gives a bad performance, even if the movie ain't that great!
The film has some good lines, mainly by the great Sean Connery, who is a hallowed presence in the movie.Arne Glimcher's film is about a Harvard law professor who decides to reopen a murder case, eight years after the case closed due to a plea of innocence.
Several turns are predictable or hard to believe, but this film also shows some interesting character development with Sean Connery, who seems to be a little too old for this role, but was quite believable as the law teacher, who had to learn some lessons about reality and law as it is practised in reality.
But since the plot, especially the last third or so, is really contrived, and Kate Capshaw is so annoyingly bad and shallow in a key part that usually calls for a more sensitive performance, I can not really recommend this film wholeheartedly without having a guilty conscience.
The film is mediocre, but seeing Ed Harris' performance as a manipulative serial killer (I'm not giving anything away by telling you this) is worth the entire movie.
This professor is a retired lawyer named Paul Armstrong, (Sean Connery) who has reason to believe that a man on death row is innocent of rape and murder of a very pretty little white girl.
Here it's Connery in the do-gooder Poitier role while the black Fishburne takes the Stieger part.Bobby Earl is on death row for the rape and murder of a young white girl.
He enlists the help of Connery's law professor to take his case on board arguing that serial killer Ed Harris has confessed to the murder while in jail.
Luckily we have the great Ed Harris exuding genuine menace as the incarcerated serial killer, wielding his power, Hannibal Lector style from inside his prison walls, while Blair Underwood as Bobby Earl displays real promise, suave and bland enough to make you wonder if he is guilty or not..
A corrupt black hating cop, Christopher Murray is a nasty and detestable piece of work, really making us think the poor young convict, Blair Underwood, is innocent of committing an atrocious murder of a little black girl.
Underwood implores Harvard law professor, Connery, to take up his case again, as serial killer monster, an unforgettably evil Hannibal Lector'ish Harris, who's murdered his folks, has confessed to the killing, too.
Just cause is a psychological thriller, but it's a manipulative one too, in the way it shows death row prisoners, pulling the wool over your eyes, using their intellect to befool you, if for notoriety or a bid for freedom where by the end you really feel suckered, as really there wasn't much a puzzle.
I consider Just Cause one of my favorite Sean Connery's movies, it is a tense psychological thriller with excellent performances from the Cast, especially Connery..it also has one of the best lines i have seen in movies, so the dialog is pretty good in this one..
It also has one of the best scenes in movies ever, when Sean interviews Ed Harris's character in prison is just fantastic..i enjoyed this one a lot and i can not recommend this enough, really do not miss this one !
Things then take a dark turn as the good professor learns a hard lesson himself...Solid thriller has good acting by all, and efficient direction, but it is the surprising story turns that really make this stand out, and it is good to see a Hollywood film not take the obvious,(and easy) way out in regards to the controversial subject matter, which lead to an exciting and satisfying end..
Ed Harris's work in this film is up to his usual standard of excellence, that is, he steals the screen away from anyone with whom he shares it, and that includes the formidable Sean Connery.
Certain actors just seem pretty much the same regardless of what role they play, and at least for me, Connery is one of them.The story has numerous twists and turns in it, but they're all of the kind you can see coming a long way away.
Sean Connery is an anti-death penalty crusader brought in to save a seemingly innocent young black man (Blair Underwood) from the ultimate penalty.
Seems like this movie had two parts,, first, the leadup to what has happened and what we assume to be the conclusion,, second part is where all of the twists come into play,, I have to admit at first that they confused the heck out of me trying to figure it all out,, Sean Connery,, and Laurence Fishbourne star in the movie,, with small supporting roles for Daniel J Travanti and Ned Beaty..
Each actor in this movie is a pleasure to watch (especially Ed Harris, who's convincingly scary and crazy, without hamming it up too much) and the plot offers lots of unpredictable twists and turns.
I was able to watch most of this movie on an old movies channel while waiting for the total LUNAR eclipse last night.It is about a law professor, Sean Connery as Paul Armstrong, going down south to help free a man who was convicted of murder.
The story revolves around a court case in which a black man, sentenced to death for raping and murdering a white little girl, claims to be innocent.
The film does also somewhat philosophical considerations about justice and how it should be done.In summary, this is an excellent thriller where tension follows the entire movie and holds your attention to the end.
Just Cause (1995)Plot In A Paragraph: A Harvard professor (Connery) is lured back into the courtroom after 25 years to take the case of a young black man condemned to death for the horrific murder of a child.I don't get the hate aimed at this move, as I enjoy it.
Connery gives his usual solid performance, whilst Laurence Fishburn, Blair Underwood, Kate Capshaw (Mrs Steven Spielberg) Ned Beatty and Ed Harris are all solid, and we even get an early role from Scarlet Johansson, whilst I just love seeing Ruby Dee in anything.
After to read the comments here my first reflection is how hard is to make good movies like this in America, where people have troubles understanding The Simpons plots...but after to read the Dr Jacques COULARDEAU comment from the nice France Im clear the problem is global....In this good movie you can see very clear how bad is work from the prejudice, even if is a liberal one...and how easy is to build prejudices from the safe academy...and how long in the way from theory and reality when is about people, evilness and society...sadly the good intention is ruined in the last part, probably because the director remembered his target audience...the moral of this tale:the best option for filmmakers is to look for a new job....
Ed Harris truly did a superb job and I loved the mention of Florida State, but the ending was terrible and absurd and featured Laurence Fishburne's on screen daughter talking like a Northerner and letting a strange man (Connery) walk into her house.
Heavy handed, guilt ridden and clichéd it moves along at an even pace not ever becoming fully engaging except after we meet a very disturbing psycho-killer (an unforgettable Ed Harris).Not a bad film, it is just trying to be too much and delivers some really unremarkable remedies to tie it all together and it ends up making the movie more confusing and less satisfying than it had to be.A modicum of a script rewrite, eliminating some of the weakness to interject intellectual insights and complex motivations might have made this much more satisfying as a down and dirty ditty of good vs evil.
"Just Cause," a 1995 thriller with Sean Connery as a law professor who takes his knowledge into the "real" world when attempting to clear a black man of a murder conviction, is neither good nor believable, despite a surprising second half.Connery, once again playing the kind of dignified, seemingly all-knowing man of virtue that seems to be the only way in which producers see him, once again demonstrates why it took him so long to shake off the image of James Bond:  he simply does not choose his projects carefully enough.
There's nothing mystical about the character he plays in "Just Cause," and whatever pomposity he displays doesn't last long, but Connery is once again an aloof, "I just came down from the clouds" kind of guy; a professor of law who agrees to help clear a Death Row inmate of the charge that he raped and murdered a little white girl.
The performances by Connery, Laurence Fishburne and Kate Capshaw are strictly average, but Ed Harris as a serial killer is so good, you wish he were in a better movie.
But this movie is about a retired lawyer who hasn't practised for 20 years getting involved with a black guy on Death Row so it begins in true Horror mode when we see him beaten up.According to him he suffered a couple of weeks of beatings yet when he's seen he hasn't a scratch on him he looks like your average everyday black.
By the time Bobby Earl-the black man who sounds more like a member of a doowop group-is in court for a retrial to prove miscarriage of justice he's cleared but that's not quite the end.
Sean Connery, Kate Capshaw, Blair Underwood, Ruby Dee, Ed Harris, and Laurence Fishburne star in "Just Cause," a film from 1995.Connery plays a professor, Paul Armstrong, who lectures at Harvard against capital punishment.
Now he's on death row.Bobby is young, good-looking, and well-educated black man, and it's easy for Paul to see why he was disliked in this one-horse town.
Bobby believes that another inmate, Blair Sullivan (Harris) might know something about the murders.I really enjoyed this film, but I will agree with other people on this board that it fell apart at the end.
I enjoyed this movie, granted it is mainly because I enjoy seeing Sean Connery act and this one has the added bonus of having Ed Harris and Lawrence Fishburne in it too.
The director was certainly burning with a desire to make his own "silence of the lambs",as Ed Wood tries to recapture Anthony Hopkins' intensity,but even for an excellent actor like him,it's a waste of breath.When you cannot rely on a solid script,it leads you nowhere.Sean Connery does not seem to believe in what's he's doing-A far cry from his great parts of the seventies like "Robin and Marian"(1976) and "the man who would be king" (1975)-and he gives a listless performance.He's not given strong support by Kate "temple of doom" Capshaw,who could be his daughter anyway.As soon as the black convict is released from jail,everything becomes predictable and implausible at once.A run of the mill thriller..
We think that this movie is going to be about something with Connery's conviction against  capitol punishment in the beginning but it turns out to be nothing but a standard, contrived for the audience's sake, run of the mill, let's never get it over with, thriller.
Yes there is some good acting here, especially from Blair Underwood, Fishburne, and Ed Harris in a psycho-supporting role but the story does not work from almost the beginning to the very long-awaited end..
It's about some black man who is accused of having murdered a little girl and therefore he is send to the electric chair, to stop all this injustice they bring in the help from ex-professor Sean Connery.
Then the Bobby Earl character,(played by Blair Underwood)the main bad guy in the movie, is black.
That's the argument I used to convince my wife to rent this instead of the 'Joy Luck Club' again.I think I'd sit through the pain of the entire showing of the Joy Luck Club rather that watch the ending of Just Cause again.Things looked good - the plot moved along well, and the characters were played quite nicely....
"Just Cause" is a disappointing movie about a law professor (Sean Connery) who is trying to free a condemned killer (Blair Underwood) on death row for a crime he did not commit.
How does a director cast Sean Connery, Laurence Fishburne, Ruby Dee and Ed Harris in the same film, set it in the deep south with the potential of atmosphere and suspense galore, start off with a pretty nifty premise concerning a man unjustly sentence to the chair--and come up with a turkey?
Sean Connery is a good reason to see "Just Cause" if there is one, but wrestling alligators, deceptive main characters and the truth is a shade far-fetched for my liking..
A Compelling Thriller!!, 10 December 2005 Author:littlehammer16787 from United StatesJust CauseStarring:Sean Connery,Laurence Fishburne, and Blair Underwood.A liberal,though good-hearted Harvard law professor Paul Armstrong is convoked to the Flordia Everglades by unjustly convicted black guy Bobby Earl.Confessing that sadistic,cold-hearted cops vilifyied and beat him to a pulp to get the confession of a gruesome murder of an eleven year old girl.
Despite not having practiced law for decades, teacher and anti-death penalty speaker Paul Armstrong takes the case of a young black man (Bobby Earl) who has been on death row for almost 8 years and needs help with an appeal.
"Just Cause" is a well-done thriller: assuredly directed (it was only Arne Glimcher's second film, but you'd never know it), with a strong sense of place (the American South), a top-notch cast (Sean Connery and Laurence Fishburne are as commanding as ever; Ed Harris is perhaps a little over-the-top but genuinely disturbing), and one spectacular car stunt.
Anyone who has never seen a thriller, a court drama, a story about serial killers, an anti-death penalty plot, scenery being gobbled by Ed Harris, the Everglades, or a movie unsure enough of itself that it has to front load the whole thing with a bunch of big and medium names will find Just Cause absolutely riveting.Oh, JC wasn't bad (except for Sean Connery looking a bit bewildered).
JUST CAUSE showcases Sean Connery as a Harvard law prof, Kate Capshaw (does she still get work?) as his wife (slight age difference) and Lawrence Fishburne as a racist southern cop (!) and Ed Harris in a totally over the top rendition of a fundamentalist southern serial killer.Weird casting, but the movie plays serious mindf** with the audience.
Paul Armstrong is a liberal, Scottish-born, professor of law at Harvard, known for his passionate opposition to the death penalty, who is hired to take on the case of Bobby Earl, a young black man from Florida who has been convicted of the rape and murder of Joanie Shriver, an eleven year old white girl.
Sean Connery as Armstrong and Laurence Fishburne as the black Sheriff are rather better, but neither is good enough to save the film.
The first half of the film looks like a standard liberal "issue" movie, anti-death penalty, anti-racist and critical of heavy-handed policing.
You just can't imagine how many stereotypes were actually used in this film.How else would you call: Two racist cops beat up and torture an innocent black man (who isn't accepted in his community because he is smart, well educated and handsome), to make him confess that he kidnapped, raped and murdered a beautiful, blond 11-year old girl.
Basically law professor Paul Armstrong (Sir Sean Connery) is given a letter by Evangeline (Ruby Dee), grandmother of Bobby Earl (Blair Underwood), and he wants him to prove his innocence.