MARAUDERS

Stumbling, overplotted female-lawyer-in-peril tale continues the adventures of the beautiful but brainy Madison McCall (Outlaws, 1996), from former Atlanta Falcons footballer Green. Evan Chase, the appropriately crass, womanizing owner of the Florida Marauders, drowns after taking his regular morning plunge into the Palm Beach surf. What appear to be bruises around one of Chase's ankles signal foul play to homicide cop Lt. Donald Kratch, who's so overzealous in bringing in the bad guys that he was once willing to shoot himself (``nothing more than graze his own scalp'') in order to frame a drug-dealer. Meanwhile, Green treats us to pointlessly grisly scenes of a tall, handsome, muscular, unnamed black man stalking and then stabbing several people to death as the dangerously obsessive Kratch decides that Luther Zorn- -a tall, black, handsome, muscular hard-charging Marauders linebacker—is the likeliest suspect for Chase's murder, and perhaps for the other homicides as well. Zorn, after all, was having a torridly passionate affair with Chase's wife, Vivian, and was glimpsed at the scene. Worse, Zorn has been undergoing psychoanalysis for barely repressed, violently homicidal rages—a souvenir of a tragic underclass childhood. Into this mess strides the stunning, ultracompetent McCall. Now married to retired football safety Cody Grey, she finds herself sexually intrigued by Zorn, whom she agrees to defend. This infuriates the ``wolf,'' a mystery man framing Zorn as part of a tediously complicated plan to move the Marauders out of Florida in a way that would enrich charming corporate raider Aaron Crawford. Before McCall can even think of going into a courtroom, however, she's marked for death and ends up having an unscheduled meeting with Zorn's evil brother Leeland. Green does offer a few exciting scenes of football action, but they sink in a dim swamp of gratuitous bloodshed and interracial fury. (Radio satellite tour)