Extreme Prejudice is a 1987 American neo-Western action thriller film starring Nick Nolte and Powers Boothe, with a supporting cast including Michael Ironside, María Conchita Alonso, Rip Torn, William Forsythe, and Clancy Brown. The film was directed by Walter Hill, with a screenplay by Harry Kleiner and Deric Washburn (the latter collaborated with Michael Cimino on Silent Running and The Deer Hunter) from a story by John Milius and Fred Rexer. Extreme Prejudice is an homage, of sorts, to The Wild Bunch, a western directed by Sam Peckinpah, with whom Hill worked on The Getaway. Both films end with a massive gunfight in a Mexican border town. The title originates from "terminate with extreme prejudice", a phrase popularized by Apocalypse Now, also written by Milius. The lead character of Jack Benteen (Nolte) was loosely based on Joaquin Jackson. Nolte spent three weeks in Texas with Jackson learning the day-to-day activities of a Ranger. Nolte took what he learned and incorporated it into his character's mannerisms and dress. Plot A teletype message flashes across the screen: Master Sergeant Larry McRose (Clancy Brown), U.S. Army, Frankfurt, West Germany Report to Zombie Unit, El Paso, Texas At the airport in El Paso, Texas, five U.S. Army sergeants meet up with Major Paul Hackett (Michael Ironside), the leader of the clandestine Zombie Unit, composed of soldiers reported to be killed-in-action and on temporary assignment under Hackett for the duration of a secret mission. Jack Benteen (Nick Nolte) is a tough Texas Ranger. His best friend from high school is Cash Bailey (Powers Boothe), a former police informer who has crossed into Mexico and became a major drug trafficker. Bailey tries to bribe Benteen to look the other way while sending major drug shipments to the U.S. When Benteen refuses, he is left with a warning by Bailey: Look the other way, or die trying. Benteen and his friend, Sheriff Hank Pearson (Rip Torn), are ambushed by Bailey's men at a gas station outside of town, and Pearson is killed in the shootout; Benteen realizes Bailey set them up. Hackett and McRose watch the firefight from a distance. Two of Bailey's men who escaped the shootout try to steal their vehicle and are killed. The Zombie Unit arrives in town tracking Bailey. When they attempt to rob a local bank, the getaway is inadvertently foiled; one soldier is killed and two others are caught and