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Good story, Not enough for a whole film

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

There's no way I can possibly love it entirely but I just think its ridiculously bad, but enjoyable at the same time.

Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

RENEGADES is your standard buddy-buddy action cop thriller from the late '80s, with the twist here that one of the central twosome is a Native American and the other's, well, Kiefer Sutherland. Otherwise it's business as usual as the pair are forced into an unlikely partnership when they have to track down a gang of diamond thieves.The film benefits immensely from the presence of skilled director Jack Sholder, straight from the excellent B-flick gem THE HIDDEN and bringing plenty of style in his wake. The early heist-turned-chase sequence is the definite highlight of the whole movie and although it never regains this level of expertise, it proves to be perfectly adequate.The script is fairly routine but the addition of some Indian philosophy (and more than a little mumbo-jumbo) makes for a welcome change. Sutherland is a solid leading man even this early in his career, but Lou Diamond Phillips is the real star, bringing a zen-like calm to his character. RENEGADES isn't brilliant and certainly doesn't have the intensity of the likes of the first two LETHAL WEAPONs but it does pass the time well enough.

Given the sheer number of successful buddy films in the 80s and 90s you might wonder how such a simple formula could be misused? After all, the buddy shtick is simply there to justify a bunch of action sequences and perhaps some snappy dialogue. First the formula for a good buddy picture. Have one guy meet another guy he shouldn't get along with, give them both a bad guy to hate and cue the explosions and car chases! Get it? Just keep it simple, don't try too hard and make sure a bunch of guys end up dead. In Renegades, two guys from disparate backgrounds are drawn together when they must unite to track down a bad guy who has done done them wrong!Bingo! Put some titles at the front and credits at the end and I'm in! The two guys are Buster McHenry (Keifer Sutherland) and Hank Storm (Lou Diamond Phillips) who play an undercover cop and a person of Native American heritage respectively, an Indian for the cheap seats. As you can see above Keifer and Lou (sounds weird with the DP part), fresh of The Lost Boys and La Bamba respectively and Young Guns combined, went into what should be a B-movie and kicked it up a notch. One thing I can say for Keifer is that he always seems to be trying, he won't allow himself to just coast through a film, and I always thought LDP was cool even with his slightly girly hair. Unfortunately after both enjoyed the 80s and early 90s hot streak their careers went in opposite directions, Keifer ultimately landing the well respected and long running 24, and LDP being left with the reality of being little more than a direct to video guy and TV show guest actor. Keeping with the broad stereotypes the bad guys are a faceless Italian-American crime syndicate lead by a charismatic but vicious bloke who looks like a 5% off Johnny Depp, the real JD would have made this the perfect 80s movie, but I think he was still Jump Streeting at this stage. How he caused the respective gentleman grief is not important: aside from motivating them to hunt him down for their own personal reasons, good old fashioned vengeance and a sense of justice among them. It also leads to some solid and in this case, extremely inventive set pieces that push Renegades ahead of several other pretenders from the era. The first car chase after a botched diamond heist into which Buster is inadvertently involved is a doozy, it takes around 12 minutes and seamlessly embroils Hank into the proceedings at the half way point. So once the boys band together to further unite them against a common foe events transpire that they are being hunted by both the Mafia crime family and the cops, meaning they must rely solely on each other, for a brief time the film also introduces a young woman, for what reason I am unsure, as she is not a love interest as much as someone who is in a few scenes before being shot. I'll leave it at this: There is a reason Jami Gertz is not on the cover of the DVD. Some of the best scenes emanate from the fact that Buster wants to work alone, and that Hank needs him as he is not a local and doesn't have the contacts Buster has. So the dynamic is that Buster is continually trying to ditch Hank, who is always trying to either stop this from happening or rejoining with Buster after being ditched. In short everyone how is not on the poster dies at some point in this film, the goodies die to add importance and gravitas to the film, and build the need for vengeance, the bad guys because bad guys deserve to die and because someone has to win. As you can see that is a lot of people, in true buddy tradition the guys that deserve it more die in a more graphic and painful manner. This is called Movie-Karma. One last point: There are many times in this film where there is gunfire or the need for police intervention, but the police response times in Renegades are simply off the charts. In more than three occasions, if my memory serves they are on the scene less than a minute after the first shots are fired. In the case of the finale no sooner has the last shot rung out and the required bad guys have eaten lead the cops are there, which might not be such a big deal if the film hadn't indicated that the location was in the middle of nowhere and a long drive though empty territory! Final Rating – 7.5 / 10. The simple things are often the best. Broad stereotypes, obeying the formula and in this case leaving out the snappy and inane death quips leads to an excellent and too often overlooked action flick.If you liked this review (or even if you didn't) check out oneguyrambling.com

I can't understand why the cop drama/action film 'Renegades' has such a steady following (relegating it, of course, to cult status), although I can guess that it's familiar cast--Sutherland, Phillips, and Gertz--had much to do with it, because this is certainly one bland, if not condescending "thriller." Kiefer Sutherland plays good cop and bad cop. He's working undercover investigating a ruthless gang leader who is in cahoots with a dirty cop and brokers a deal with the gang leader on a jewel heist in exchange for giving up the cop's name. But, the ruthless leader is of course, ruthlessly violent, and the heist goes seriously foul. When the leader decides to take with him a valuable Native American relic, killing one young man's brother in the action, Lou Diamond Phillips seeks revenge like a martial arts film.This movie is wholly unconvincing. You can figure it out almost immediately who the "dirty cop" as it is done without any subtleties. The story lingers on far longer than it should, especially with all of the effects of car chases and explosions of a good (if not cheesy) action film, minus the need for all of it. With either Sutherland's arrogant and seemingly out-of-place character or Phillip's "spiritual-mined" character-with-a-vengeance, this film probably would've been much better, even if following more of a martial arts genre routine, with just the story of the Native American family seeking revenge on the drug dealer. There is something here that does not mesh between the two main leads. And Gertz is wasted altogether.For a good 1980s cop thriller, look elsewhere.

I will always like this movie for 3 reasons- 1. That Jami Gertz was in it--2. That fellow Canadian Kiefer Sutherland was in it and 3. It was shot here in Toronto,Ontario downtown and I watched alot of the location shooting. I remember watching alot of the filming downtown and they had alot of the streets blocked off that made for traffic nightmares donwtown Toronto. But getting to meet Jami Gertz was the exciting part. She was very friendly to the people who would be standing around watching the filming. At this time I had only known who she was from Lost Boys and the TV Show Square Pegs.Anyhow Kiefer is great in this as a cop who is on a corruption in the police force task force but seems to never have the best luck. Lou Diamond Phillips plays a native indian and he is not too bad in it. But Jami Gertz I say steals this movie for sure. Lots of pretty good action and shoot ups. I don't see what people never liked about it. I guess nowadays it is just waaay too hard to have a viewer actually not go into watching a movie with a closed mind nowadays unless someone like Tom Cruise or Brad pitt is in it. I didn't really see any boring parts in it and Sutherland,Phillips and Gertz all together have some charisma on screen. Surprising with Phillips who is usually hot and cold in his flicks.