An unscrupulous DA hires a ruthless hit man to rescue his daughter and dispatch her kidnappers, but when she learns why she has been taken, the daughter sides with her captors in their struggle for survival...and justice.

SYNOPSIS:

After spending the last eleven years in prison for a crime he claims to be innocent of, bitter ex-con LUTHER GRIMES is determined to avenge this miscarriage of justice by kidnapping the daughter of the man who wronged him...

...SIMON BECK, the overly ambitious PA at his trial. Luther is convinced Simon withheld evidence that could have exonerated him and is determined to prove it.

With the help of his own daughter, MOLLY, and his girlfriend, ex-prison guard DARLA EVANS, the threesome kidnap RACHEL BECK and hold her hostage. When they contact Simon, via Rachel's phone, they have two goals:

1) Make Simon feel Luther's pain (Darla was pregnant with Molly at the time of the trial and the only contact Luther has had with Molly has been a handful of prison visits).

2) Persuade Simon to come clean about the trial so that he pays for his misdeeds and Luther can finally have justice.

But Simon values his career too much to do anything that would jeopardize it. Instead of complying, he hires sadistic professional killer, HITOMI KWAN, to rescue Rachel and off her kidnappers....

...whom idealistic Rachel becomes more and more sympathetic toward the more she learns about why she's been abducted. Still conflicted over her love for her father, Rachel loyalties are tested once Kwan arrives on the scene.

After an encounter that leaves Luther in a coma and Darla on the verge of being executed, Rachel makes her choice, snatching up Luther's pistol and shooting Kwan in the chest. He staggers backwards and falls onto a kerosene lamp, knocking it over and igniting a nearby gas generator. Following a huge explosion, the cabin is ablaze and Darla and the girls drag Luther away from the flames just in time.

Meanwhile, Simon has been arrested, as his trophy wife, ANDREA, overheard the phone conversation about hiring Kwan and ratted him out to the police. Simon refuses to cooperate...

...until Rachel is brought in and the two have a face-to-face. Rachel convinces Simon to admit his wrong-doings in exchange for her forgiveness. He is true to his word and, at his trial, months later, admits that it was actually he who committed the hit-and-run eleven years ago and framed Luther for it.

Luther has remained in a coma all this time but finally shows signs of life after an emotional visit from Darla. Still unconscious, memories begin flooding into his mind, and we finally learn the truth about what happened the night Luther was arrested:

An intoxicated Luther, traveling along a lonely county road, hits something big, stops to investigate, and glimpses a large buck scurry into the brush. As he heads back to his car, he hears a faint cry for help and there, at the edge of his headlight beams, finds MILO JENKINS, whom Simon had accidentally plowed into and dumped there earlier. Milo pleads with Luther to call 911 but Luther, instead, crashes Milo's head into the pavement, killing him just as the state troopers arrive.

Why? His memories also reveal that Milo had been blackmailing Luther to guarantee his silence about a one-night stand Luther had with some woman he met at a bar...who turns out to be Simon's first wife, EMILY (Rachel's mother), who was determined to get even with Simon for his philandering and had picked Luther at random to seduce.

Given the earlier references to Molly and Rachel being similar enough to be sisters, one is left to conclude that Luther – not Simon – may very well be Rachel's biological father!

V E N G E A N C E