Independent Films, Film Profiles

Final Justice (1984 film)

Final Justice is a 1984 film starring Joe Don Baker and directed by Greydon Clark. It follows the exploits of a Texas sheriff who overturns a Maltese city to find the bad guy who killed his partner. The film was lampooned in 1999 on Mystery Science Theater 3000. It is the second Joe Don Baker film to be riffed on MST3K, following Mitchell, to which a few references are made in this episode.Joe Don Baker plays Texas "lawman" Thomas Jefferson Geronimo III, a beefy sheriff and avid milk drinker. His partner, the former sheriff, is killed by an Italian mobster. He finds the criminal, a man named Joseph Palermo, and escorts him back to Europe, only to lose him in the capital city of Valletta in Malta. He then thumbs his nose at local law enforcement and uses all the tactics of Texas justice to pursue Palermo. A cat-and-mouse game follows, rife with car chases, gunfights, fistfights and boat chases.