Outlaw Justice

Throughout his eight-year incarceration, vicious gunslinger Holden (Sancho Gracia) seethed about the failure of his four criminal cronies to spring him. But unlike the unrepentant Holden, all four have left the outlaw life behind them: Jesse Ray Torrance (Kris Kristofferson) and Lee Walker (Willie Nelson) earned official pardons through military service, Tobey (Waylon Jennings) became a rancher and Dalton (Travis Tritt) transformed himself into a lawman. After serving his sentence, Holden celebrates his freedom by gunning down Tobey, and to the dismay of Tobey's son, Bryce (Chad Willett), the townspeople refuse to bury the reformed bandit on hallowed ground. When they get wind of this, Torrance and Walker blow into town to modify the official burial policy. Having laid their buddy to rest, they gallop off with tenderfoot Bryce and vengeance on their minds. Though Bryce doesn't much care for his father's lawbreaking past, he realizes that Tobey's former partners stand a better change of dealing with Holden than he does. After outwitting range robbers with the help of Indian friends, the trio gets a lukewarm reception in Santa Mesa, where Dalton is the sheriff. After a bank robbery, the strangers are accused of reverting to type, but Dalton saddles up with old comrades, figuring that together they can both retrieve the stolen loot and settle the score with Holden. Meanwhile, Holden has been laying a trap with the aid of the Mexican Army, who haven't forgotten that Torrance and Walker's fought against them while in Uncle Sam's army. Can Dalton, Bryce, Torrance and Walker survive Holden's ambush in the Mexican town of Almeria?

This sort of old-fashioned oater seems almost quaint in the post Deadwood age, but director Bill Corcoran stages the climactic shoot-out with vigor and the cast does its best to spice up screenwriter Gene Quintano's standard-issue tale of prairie justice. leave a comment --Robert Pardi