The Hired Hand 1971

Two saddle tramps, Harry Collings and Arch Harris, have spent seven years wandering the American Southwest with a younger companion, Dan Griffen. While fishing, they haul from a river the corpse of a small white child. Harry returns the body to the water, and it is swept away.

The trio drifts into Del Norte, a ramshackle town in the middle of nowhere that is secretly run by a corrupt boss named McVey. Arch and Dan talk about making their way to California for work when Harry reveals he’s grown weary of aimless wandering and wants to return to his home, wife, and daughter he left seven years ago. Dan steps away outside the bar to fetch more alcohol, while McVey hatches a plan to claim Dan’s horse by murdering him, aided by his thugs. The crime is framed as a rape, and Dan is killed offscreen; the three men later bury him, only to learn the next dawn that they’ve been drawn into a larger grudge.

Harry and Arch, at first unaware, depart the town to bury their friend, but they return at dawn to seek vengeance. A brutal confrontation ensues as Harry cripples the murderer by shooting him in both feet, and the pair escape with Dan’s horse.

After riding hundreds of miles back toward the family he abandoned, Harry faces a chilly reception from his wife. To stay, he and Arch offer their services as mere hired hands. She agrees, and life tightens into a fragile, uneasy peace; Arch even hints at a longing for Hannah, while the couple gradually rebuilds a fragile bond.

The danger of McVey’s world intrudes once more when the gang assaults Harry’s newly restored life. Learning that Arch has been kidnapped and mutilated, Harry leaves his wife again to rescue his friend. In a fierce shootout with McVey’s gang, the villains are all slain, but Harry is fatally wounded in the process. In the epilogue, Hannah watches as Arch returns to the farm with a second horse, unmounted, and takes up residence as a hired hand.