While still in high school in 1953, Coleman Justice's girlfriend is gang raped and killed by a group of men after they'd gone out on a date to see an old western movie, "Shane", at a theater. Shortly after her death, the group of men are blown up by a car bomb, and most believe Coleman is responsible. Charges are never brought against him, and 35 years later Coleman is a university professor who teaches a class about western films, since he has idolized the gunfighters of cinema since he was very young. He is in a bar when a group of men begin to gang rape a waitress. He goes to his car, puts on his cowboy outfit, arms himself with a bowie knife and Colt revolver, and then proceeds to stab and shoot most of the woman's attackers. He then hunts down their leader, who got away, as well as a drug dealer, as the search for the "cowboy killer" makes newspaper headlines and his students begin to suspect he's the vigilante.