Plot summary

One morning, a suburban man is gunned down with mini-Uzis, a car salesman is run over in his own dealership, and a sailor in a tugboat is blown up in the harbor. These three murders have one thing in common - all involve former members of a commando team led by John Matrix, a hulking ex-Colonel, whose exploits have made him and his men enemies among totalitarian empires and groups around the world. Matrix and his young daughter Jenny live alone in the mountains of upstate California, but Matrix's former commanding officer, General Franklin Kirby, flies to the house to tell Matrix about the killings of his men, and leaves them in the care of two expert soldiers, as Kirby and the feds work to find the killers.No sooner does Kirby leave, go that a mass of gunmen open fire on the house and killing the two soldiers. Jenny hides in her bedroom and Matrix rushes to his shed to get his rifle. Now armed, he confronts a gunman in Jenny's room, who offers him a choice: do as they say and his daughter, now being taken away in one of the fleeing cars, lives. Matrix blasts the gunman dead and, and despite his truck disabled, he goes after the men by driving the truck down a steep mountain, intercepting one of the vehicles and attacking four armed thugs, before being beaten down himself. He then is confronted by their leader Bennett, who had been thought to be killed in the tugboat explosion. He is the one behind the killings and faked his own death to smoke out Kirby and Matrix, wanting revenge after being discharged by him from the Army for killing civilians in a South American nation whose dictator, Arias, was overthrown by Matrix's team and is also Bennett's employer.Matrix is dragooned into flying to Arias' country to overthrow its new leader, but Matrix escapes from the plane, after killing one of Arias' men assigned to watch over him, and must force the assistance of Cindy, an off-duty pilot, to help track down the men after one of them, Sully, tries to hit on her. Matrix and Cindy track down Sully at a local mall and after a violent brawl and chase up, he apprehends Sully and holds him over a steep cliff, demanding information on Jenny's whereabouts. Sully only knows what his pal Cooke knows, so Matrix drops Sully to his death. Matrix confronts Cooke at his motel room and a brawl erupts that spills into the adjacent room of an startled, amorous couple, who watch in horror as Cooke is impaled into the leg of a wooden table, killing him. Matrix then finds information in Cooke's pocket and his car that leads to a warehouse showing an island where Jenny is being held. First Matrix and Cindy raid a weapons store, but Matrix must be rescued by her from intruding police with a rocket launcher she figures out how to use by reading the available instruction manual.Matrix and Cindy hijack a seaplane and fly to the island, where he arms himself and sneaks onto the property of Arias' mansion, where he blows up barracks and slaughters many of Arias' soldiers. In the chaos, Jenny escapes to the mansion's boiler room, where she is caught by Bennett. Matrix succeeds in killing Arias by shooting him through a glass window and corners Bennett and Jenny, with Bennett shooting Matrix in the shoulder. He taunts Bennett into a fight, explaining to him Bennett can take him out. A crazed Bennett accepts the challenge and the two men engage in a final battle, ending with Matrix hurling a steam pipe into Bennett's chest, killing him. Then, a squad of army helicopters, with Kirby in one of them, arrive on the property and is surprised to see Matrix and Jenny walking towards him. Kirby offers to have Matrix rejoin his commando unit, but declines. He, Jenny, and Cindy happily board the seaplane and fly back home.