Pale Rider - Plot

Plot

The film opens near the fictional town of Lahood, California, in the 1880s (based on remarks in the film about outlawing hydraulic mining), where a group of struggling miners and their families are panning for gold. However, thugs sent by rival big-time miner Coy Lahood arrive and shoot up the camp, destroying tents and huts as well. Megan Wheeler, a 15-year old girl there, is horrified when the thugs shoot her dog. The thugs leave the camp torn up and nearly destroyed. Megan buries her dog out in the woods, and prays to God for help. After she prays, we see a stranger heading to the town on horseback.

Megan's mother, Sarah, is keeping company with Hull Barret, the leader of the miners. Hull heads off into town to pick up supplies, but the same thugs start to beat him up. The stranger arrives and swiftly beats up all of the thugs single handedly with a mattock handle. Hull thanks the stranger and invites him to his house, and the stranger reluctantly agrees. Sarah is skeptical of the stranger and is concerned the trouble it may bring. Her mind and that of the daughter are quickly assured when the pale rider appears wearing a preacher' outfit and is shown to be unarmed, and therefore gets the name of Preacher. The Preacher helps the miners pan for gold and peacefully keeps the thugs from returning to the camp.

The Preacher eventually meets Coy LaHood's son Josh who attempts to scare the Preacher by a show of strength from his strongest work hand, Club, who smashes a large rock with one blow of a hammer that the Preacher and Hull had been laboring over. When Club attempts to harm the Preacher, the Preacher disarms him, hits him in the face and delivers a hammer blow to Club's groin. After helping Club back onto his horse, the Preacher sends Josh and Club on their way. Coy LaHood finds out about the Preacher through his son and instead of killing the preacher, out of fear of making him a martyr among the pan handlers, decides to try to bribe him with money and a church in hopes he will leave the camp, but the Preacher refuses. The Preacher asks if LaHood would be willing to buy the miners out and gets a final offer of $1,000 per claim. If the miners don't leave within 24 hours, LaHood will hire a corrupt Marshal named Stockburn to clear them out.

The miners initially want to take the offer, and ask the Preacher for his advice. He offers little, but Hull reminds them why they came, and what they have sacrificed. The miners decide to stay and fight. The next morning, however, the Preacher deserts the miners, leaving them scared and alone without any help. Megan, who has grown fond of the Preacher, also heads out looking for him, but Josh captures her and attempts to rape her. Club sees what is happening and disapproves, and so moves forward to help her before Josh can do anything serious. However, at this moment the Preacher arrives on horseback, armed with a Remington revolver, and shoots Josh in the hand. The Preacher takes Megan back to her mother in the mining camp.

Stockburn arrives and he and his gang gun down one of the miners, Spider, who was drunkenly excoriating LaHood from the street. LaHood describes the Preacher to Stockburn, and Stockburn says that he sounds like someone that he once knew, but can't be, because that man is dead.

The Preacher teams up with Hull and they go to LaHood's mining facility and blow it up with dynamite. In the chaos, Josh LaHood attempts to shoot the Preacher in the back but is stopped by Club out of respect for the Preacher. To stop Hull from following him into battle, the Preacher scared off Hull's horse. The Preacher headed alone into town where he kills all but two of Coy's thugs. Stockburn then sends his deputies after the Preacher, who shoots all of them one by one throughout town. The Preacher approaches Stockburn and only when he is a few feet away does Stockburn recognize him, crying "You! YOU!" Stockburn reaches for his gun, but the Preacher draws first and empties his gun into Stockburn. As a dying Stockburn tries to raise his gun, the Preacher retrieves backup pistol and finishes off Stockburn with a shot to the forehead. Coy Lahood, watching from a nearby store, aims a rifle at the Preacher, but Hull comes in the back door and kills Coy.

The Preacher rides his horse out of a barn. He looks at Hull, who is surveying the remains of the battle and mutters to him, "Long walk." Hull responds with a simple, "Yep." The Preacher smirks and rides off into the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Megan gets to the town, but the Preacher has already left. As he rides off into the mountains, Megan cries out to him from the town shouting her thanks and words of love.