Extreme Prejudice

Extreme Prejudice centres on Jack Benteen, a Texas Ranger working the border country where drugs move north from Mexico. On the other side of that trade stands Cash Bailey, a drug kingpin who was once Benteen's childhood friend and now runs the smuggling operation Benteen is trying to shut down. The two are further bound together by Sarita, a woman both men have been involved with. Into this standoff comes Major Paul Hackett and a group of soldiers whose official records say they are dead; they are in fact alive and assembled for a covert operation, and their arrival pushes the long-running conflict toward a violent reckoning.

Walter Hill directed the film, working from a screenplay by Harry Kleiner and Deric Washburn, with Buzz Feitshans producing. It was Hill's tenth feature as director, arriving between Crossroads and Red Heat. Nick Nolte plays Benteen, Powers Boothe plays Bailey, and Michael Ironside plays Hackett, with María Conchita Alonso as Sarita, Rip Torn as Sheriff Hank Pearson and Clancy Brown as Sergeant Larry McRose among a credited cast of forty.

Released in April 1987 by TriStar Pictures and Carolco Pictures, the film cost about 22 million dollars and returned roughly 11 million worldwide, so it fell well short of its budget at the box office. Reception has been steadier than that result suggests: on IMDb it holds 6.7 out of 10 from around 9,800 votes and on TMDB 6.3 out of 10 from about 200 votes, while a critics' rating of 7 out of 10 across ten reviews places professional opinion slightly above the audience scores.