As Mitch grows closer to Chase, he realizes that Chase is under investigation by the FBI for aiding in terrorist plots as well as other criminal activities. At first, Mitch is willing to overlook Chase's operations until his co-worker is murdered, prompting him to inform the FBI of Chase's activities. The FBI tells Mitch that his co-worker was an FBI informant and talks Mitch into taking his spot, placing Mitch in a dangerous position.
Finish Line is more a victim of sloppy editing than poor plot. Some scenes are randomly inserted with very little attention to simple things like time and place. For instance, Mitch and Jessie's night out on the town is suddenly interrupted by an ultimately useless scene showing the daylight transfer of the weapon that suddenly becomes the focal point late in the movie. This scene is then followed by a continuation of the date, which accomplishes nothing. At the very least, the transfer could have taken place at night to establish some sense of continuity. Similar to Gone Baby Gone, there are also issues where the editing telegraphs events before they happen. Granted, there aren't many surprising twists given how predicable the movie is, but you would be surprised at what a few select edits can do for even the most obvious of plots.
There are also issues with nearly all of the movie's chase scenes. All of them come off as incredibly slow-paced and lack any sort of storytelling; instead they just feel like a random assortment of weak crashes (you'll swear the same police car crashes 4 -5 times in one sequence) or unnecessary explosions.
Even though it is hard to take Scott Baio seriously as a menacing crime lord, he doesn't do that bad of a job. I'll readily admit that I spent most of the movie waiting for him to tell someone that he was in charge (it doesn't happen); but looking back, he was just sleazy enough to pull off the character. The only character that really doesn't come off well is Jessie. Taylor Cole does an okay job at playing the part of eye-candy in the beginning, though when her character begins to step up later on, she seems to have a hard time establishing her character.
Finish Line isn't a terrible movie; as far as the plot and the acting is concerned it is watchable, mostly because it cuts right to the chase and doesn't waste a whole lot of time. Although some scenes, such as a random street race, feel like they were thrown in just to add another action sequence, there aren't many slow moments. At the same time, the entire movie feels like it's searching for its voice and never really finds it.
