Lean, mean Texas Ranger Jack Benteen locks horns with a former friend, Cash Bailey, now a ruthless drug kingpin. Though they're on opposite sides of the law, they share a love interest in the sensual Sarita. When a crew of rogue soldiers descends upon the border town for an off-the-books mission, all roads lead to a bloody, to-the-death showdown, as loyalties shift and the lines between good and evil are blurred.
Direction
Walter Hill's lean, muscular staging—no fat, all firepower
Acting
Boothe's snake-oil charm vs. Nolte's wounded granite
Practical Effects
Pre-CGI mayhem—real explosions, real squibs, real sweaty Texas
Director
Walter Hill
Nick Nolte
Jack Benteen
Powers Boothe
Cash Bailey
Michael Ironside
Major Paul Hackett
María Conchita Alonso
Sarita Cisneros
Rip Torn
Sheriff Hank Pearson
Clancy Brown
Sgt. Larry McRose
William Forsythe
Sgt. Buck Atwater
Matt Mulhern
Sgt. Declan Patrick Coker
Larry B. Scott
Sgt. Charles Biddle
Dan Tullis Jr.
Sgt. Luther Fry
James Lashly
Deputy Purvis
Marco Rodríguez
Deputy Cortez
Luis Contreras
Lupo
Gary Carlos Cervantes
Hector
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
This was meant to be a Sam Peckinpah project in the '70s; Hill finally made it as a tribute, even borrowing Peckinpah's slow-motion death ballet.
The 'dead' black ops unit reflects real anxiety about Iran-Contra and off-books government violence—Reagan-era paranoia in action-movie drag.
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