Danny Joe Don Baker and his three fellow veterans—Shooter Paul Koslo, Kid Alan Vint, and Fatback Elliott Street—return home from Vietnam and decide to embark on a road trip in a newly purchased Cadillac. They manage to haggle the price down from $6,200 to $5,500 and load the car with weapons, heading out with a hardened sense of camaraderie as the sun sets on their uncertain future.
On the road, they pick up a girl who initially parties with the group, but the night takes a dark turn when Danny attempts to assault her. As she fights back, she is hurled from the moving car at 65 mph, and she dies in the wake of the violence. The act haunts the group as they drift into towns and memories, the line between comradeship and danger blurring with each mile traveled.
They visit a string of old settlements, gathering in a high school gym where a basketball game plays on and memories of younger days drift through the air. Later, they check into a motel, surrounded by various women, and they drink in the echoes of their pasts. When they look for a place to stay again, they strike a deal with the Sheriff Billy Green Bush to use the jail cells for lodging for the night. The sheriff agrees but treats the arrangement more like a routine arrest than genuine hospitality, maintaining a sense of control over the volatile situation.
A breakdown forces repairs that total about $1,400, and after a tense argument the four put up the money and press on with their journey. In a diner they briefly believe they’ve won $50 from a contest, but the establishment cannot pay, and the group ends up taking from the cash register. The owner is compelled to cook meals to recoup the cost, a moment that underscores the precariousness of their road-weary world.
Their luck remains capricious as they stop at a gas pump and Danny tries to vandalize the pump to siphon gas. A shotgun-wielding observer fires, and the group retaliates, escalating into a violent spree. They arm themselves and unleash a brutal massacre across the village, flattening cars and homes as they don uniforms and claim the town as their own makeshift fortress. The memories of Vietnam surge to the surface, fueling the cold, calculated violence that follows.
The National Guard is called in, accompanying a convoy of armored vehicles and a helicopter. The gang manages to shoot the chopper down with a rocket launcher, and the guards respond with gas bombs that begin to suffocate the group. Gas masks on, soldiers advance, and the four men fight back with grenades and gunfire, but one by one they fall to the guards’ fire.
The ending scene lingers on the aftermath: the town is a ruin, and an unknown woman walks through the carnage as Danny’s voice recites the Oath of Enlistment from a recruitment center, casting a stark, fatal study on the cost of war and brotherhood gone feral. The film closes with this haunting image, leaving viewers to ponder how easily sworn loyalties can fracture into destructive impulses and what remains of the men who once believed they were returning home.
