Writers:

David Ackles (screenplay),  David Ackles (story) 

Karl Malden,  Rue McClanahan,  Ron Silver  

 

Alex Karras and Susan Clark produced but did not star in the TV movie Word of Honor. Karl Malden plays a small-town newspaper reporter who receives a tip from a woman about the kidnap-murder of a teenaged girl. The woman implicates local banker Don Crane, but only on Malden's promise that he will never divulge the woman's identity. When it looks as though Crane will beat the rap, Malden steadfastly refuses to go back on his word, which earns him the enmity of everyone except his wife (Rue McClanahan) and a visiting "liberal" Manhattan journalist. The stack-the-cards setup of Word of Honor is just on the verge of credibility when the film blows the works with a too-convenient ending.