Genre: Action/Thriller
Director: Doug Liman
Writer: Harmony Winters
Cast: Chris Evans, Ruth Wilson, Jason Clarke, Karl Urban, Giancarlo Esposito, Diane Guerrero, Diego Luna, Rodrigo Santoro, Elias Janssen, Gavin Drea
Deep in the heart of the New Mexico desert, we see Daniel Henson (Gavin Drea) getting tortured by masked men. They demand some helpful info, but Daniel keeps resisting. He spits in each of their faces enraging them all till their boss barks at them to stop. The boss calmly offers Daniel a chance at an actual peaceful death, but Daniel tells him to burn in the tenth circle of Hell. The boss laughs, taking it as a joke till he unloads every bullet into his chest. He barks for them to take care of the body. A sound of a bone saw is heard as the boss leaves, smoking on a cigar.
Called to the scene of a murder, Texas Ranger Phillip Elkmun (Giancarlo Esposito) finds fellow Ranger Daniel Henson, who was tortured and kept him alive with medication to torture him longer. Phillip calls Daniel’s brother, Ranger Ryan Henson (Chris Evans), who’s shocked and upset. At the funeral, Ryan consoles Daniel’s widow, Debra (Ruth Wilson).
Sympathetically, Phillip gives Ryan a leak from the DEA in secret. The house where Daniel’s body was found is owned by a thug named Willie (Karl Urban). Strapped with guns, Ryan goes to a bar where Willie’s known to drink. He demands to know who killed his brother. Willie’s reluctant to tell him until Ryan, a crack shot, shoots clean through the bartender’s security baseball bat while looking at him through the reflection on Willie's glasses. Willie tells Ryan it was a man named Jose Dela who frequently visits a whorehouse. Ryan pistol whips him for good measure, then heads out to find Jose.
Ryan waits outside the house until the whores leave, then bursts in, guns blazing. He wants to know who Jose’s boss is, but when Jose refuses to tell him, Ryan murders him along with most of his companions. Phillip is rousted out of bed early the following day by DEA agent Stanley Luther (Jason Clarke), who explains that one of Jose’s men was an informant who brought the DEA closer than ever to find out who ran the Tarto drug cartel.
Unhelpful, Phillip tells Luther to prove Ryan’s involvement. Luther points out that Phillip had access to the confidential DEA file that led Ryan to Willie and then to Jose, but not even convinces Phillip to help Luther. Phillip arrests Ryan by Luther's orders, or else Phillip would be arrested too.
Seven years later, Ryan is released from prison. His old Ford Bronco waits for him, maintained and tuned by Phillip, who now owns a gas and service station in town after going into retirement. After thanking Phillip for visiting and everything, Ryan goes to his isolated ranch house to start working on repairs and security measures, including motion sensors and a panic room. One night, an attractive Mexican, Estebella (Diane Guerrero), shows up on Ryan’s doorstep. She claims to be the mother of Daniel’s illegitimate child, who was kidnapped by a man named Emilio. She begs Ryan for help. Ryan refuses. He goes to Phillip’s garage to see if Phillip has information about Emilio. Phillip refuses to help him, fearing Ryan’s plan to kill again. Ryan explains the bit about Estebella birthing Daniel’s child. Not wanting to help Ryan get into trouble, Phillip still won’t help.
Ryan goes to the motel where Estebella stays, telling her to arrange a time and place to meet Emilio. Estebella asks how Ryan would get her the $10,000 ransom. Ryan contently notes he has ways to gather that much cash. On the way to the Mexican bar where they’ve agreed to meet Emilio, Ryan meets up with Phillip, who has dug up the information on Emilio, who's known for kidnapping, being insanely dangerous, and always brings back-up.
Emilio (Rodrigo Santoro) and his thugs hang around at the bar, keeping close watch over the kid, Danny (Elias Janssen). Ryan hands off the money, but Estebella reveals she’s working with Emilio, who claimed he’d pay her half the ransom. Instead, Emilio kills her. They tie up Ryan and take him away. He goes quietly. In the Spanish hacienda basement, Ryan's tortured by Fabio Augustine (Diego Luna), the Tarto cartel leader. He claims to have protected Ryan during his prison sentence because one of the men Ryan killed was his nephew, so he wanted the pleasure of killing Ryan himself. In the past, Fabio tells a long story about getting into the trade: a Mexican doctor making a low wage and working with inferior equipment. One night, a man came in with abdominal pain but refused to say what he had eaten. Because Fabio couldn’t care for him properly, the man died. When Fabio performed the autopsy, he learned the man had three condoms filled with heroin in his digestive tract.
One had burst, but the other two were intact. Fabio took the intact condoms and changed careers. Fabio threatens Ryan with a deck of cards: if he cuts the deck and finds an ace of spades, he will kill Ryan. If not, he’ll just torture him. Fabio falls back on his medical training to torture without killing. He pulverizes Ryan’s shooting hand, detaches one of his corneas, and leaves Ryan to await further torture. Later, when somebody comes in to give him more medication, Ryan kills the man, takes his gun, all his medical syringes, and flees the seemingly empty hacienda.
He manages to get to Debra’s house, begging for help coincidentally; she’s a doctor. She wants to call an ambulance, but he refuses to let her. Ryan tells Debra to call Phillip but then passes out. When Phillip arrives, Ryan has regained consciousness. He tells Ryan he knew it was an ambush but let it happen so he could be led to the man responsible for Daniel’s death. Phillip’s surprised to hear Fabio’s name by this time; everyone knows who he is. Ryan asks for a favor, which Phillip arranges: a sham funeral made real with proper paperwork. With everyone convinced he’s dead, Ryan can take some time to recuperate. He begs Debra for help getting to Fabio. She’s reluctant to help. She doesn’t want Ryan to end up dead, too but agrees when Ryan tells her about Daniel’s kid. She takes Ryan out to practice shooting, but he has difficulty losing depth perception and a bad hand. When Debra removes his cast, Ryan demands that she cut out the clotting areas making his hand swell.
Phillip comes over to Debra’s house. He subtly implies that Ryan should leave Debra out of this. Ryan tells Phillip it’s not over yet. Phillip tries to talk sense to him to move on and come back to society. Ryan explains he can't stop in an emotional moment since this cost seven years of imprisonment and destruction of his life. He warns if Phillip won't join him, then Phillip needs to get out of the way. That night, Ryan tries to test the grip of his bad hand.
Getting back home, Debra awaits to tell him he doesn’t need to do this since Fabio thinks he’s dead. Ryan reminds her about Danny. Debra tells Ryan she knew Daniel was messing around, blaming herself for pulling away when she found she couldn’t have kids.
Ryan has a dream/memory of Daniel getting involved in a hostage negotiation involving a child. Ryan sneaks into the scene and shoots Daniel in the ass to get a clear shot at the perpetrator. Afterward, Daniel yells at him for not allowing him to negotiate. Ryan tells Daniel that he dropped his gun to gain some trust, and all bets were off.
The following day, Phillip helps Ryan rig his shoulder holsters to reach both guns even with his wrong hand. He warns Phillip about various traps he’s set around his ranch house, telling Phillip to pick up Debra and take her to the motel to wait it out. Debra wakes up and finds a note from Ryan, telling her to go with Phillip when he comes and giving her his bank account information just in case.
Ryan sets up a sniper perch on Fabio’s hacienda. He waits, staking out the place until the right moment. When the time is right, he wedges a stick on his Bronco’s accelerator and aims it at the hacienda. With the men distracted, Ryan takes most of them out from his sniper perch. Then, he moves in closer, where he kills the remaining people and gets to Danny. Ryan promises Danny safety, asking if he wants to come with him. Danny goes. Ryan spreads out a deck of cards, all aces of spades. Fabio and his top men return to the hacienda and find all their men dead, and the authorities hear afar driving up. Fabio tells his men to call any available mercenaries and offer a $25 Million reward on Phillip and Debra.
Ryan brings Danny to the ranch house. He prepares for what he knows is coming taking Danny to the panic room. He tells Danny to lock himself inside and wait until he hears a secret password between them both. He uses this as a device to calm Danny down. Ryan asks for trust, and Danny nods. Phillip picks up Debra and takes her to the motel. He leaves her in the room and goes to the attached diner to get some coffee. Willie Willie works the grill. He sees Phillip; Phillip sees him and knows what to expect. He returns to the room where Debra’s showering and insists they must leave immediately. Debra doesn’t understand and won’t give up her shower. It’s a moot point because it’s too late. Phillip only has time to call Ryan and warn him before SUVs full of gangsters show up. Ryan rushes to the motel. A wild gunfight ensues. Phillip manages to hold his own against the many thugs, but it’s not enough. He’s fatally wounded. Ryan shows up in time to take out the remaining men, including Willie, who Ryan kills in cold blood.
Earlier, Fabio and his mean have been waiting outside Ryan’s ranch house for him to leave. When he does, they go in and find the safe room. Ryan drags Debra back to the ranch house, where he’s set up a sniper perch. Ryan’s annoyed to find that Fabio and his men are already there. He tells Debra to call the sheriff, but Debra doesn’t have a cell phone. He sends her to go get the sheriff and bring him back. When she leaves, Ryan starts sniping. Fabio tells his men to cut the power. After the lights go out, Ryan starts firing blindly to give Debra time. Fabio knows Ryan can’t see anything, or else he won’t be missing. Two of Fabio’s men find the sniper perch. It seems like Ryan’s done for, but as they take one of his guns, he comes at them with an ankle gun, killing them both.
Fabio instructs his men to set a small C4 charge to blow the safe room door. It doesn’t exactly work the door opens slightly, enough for one man to get a hand through, but Danny stabs him with a paring knife. Annoyed, Fabio decides to go with a more significant charge. If it kills Danny, so be it. His men set up the cost. Ryan moves closer to the house. He manages to kill everyone but Fabio, who grabs the detonator and threatens Ryan. Since they’re all in such close quarters, they all die if Fabio detonates the charge. In response, Ryan gives Danny the password. Danny fiddling with the locks momentarily distracts Fabio, allowing Ryan to shoot Fabio’s detonating thumb.
Then, he shoots Fabio in the head. Danny comes clear of the safe room just as the sheriff’s department surrounds the ranch house. Ryan sends Danny out, telling him to find a woman named Debra, who will take care of him. Then, still in the place, he detonates the charge, blowing the house sky high.
Danny is introduced to Debra. The sheriff is OK with this, seeing as how they’re pseudo-kin. They figure the explosion of the house means Ryan is really dead, but he’s not. He watches Debra and Danny’s awkward introduction before walking unnoticed into the night.
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