Vendetta 1986

Karen Chase plays Laurie Collins, a striking and highly skilled stuntwoman working in the film industry. Her current job pulls her to a small town near where her younger sister, Michelle Newkirk as Bonnie Cusack, lives, so Laurie invites Bonnie to visit the set since she likely won’t be able to visit on her own. Bonnie readily agrees, and a night of partying sets the stage for tragedy and consequences that ripple far beyond these quiet streets.

On a fateful bar outing, Bonnie is picked up by a man who tries to rape her at gunpoint. Drawing on self-defense lessons she learned from her sister, Bonnie overpowers the attacker and ends up killing him with his own weapon. What should be a clear case of self-defense becomes a loaded problem when the victim turns out to be the son of a powerful local politician. As an outsider in the town, Bonnie is seen as trouble, and she is convicted of murder. The judge lectures that while her actions may have seemed justified, she cannot take the law into her own hands, and she is sentenced to a term in the state prison.

Inside, Bonnie encounters a harsh reality. Kay Butler, [Sandy Martin], an influential trustee inmate, immediately makes life difficult for her. Kay rules a tight circle, and Bonnie’s first days behind bars involve intimidation, manipulation, and a dangerous power dynamic. When Kay’s group crosses a line and Bonnie is assaulted, she resists and fights back. The attack escalates quickly, and Kay’s gang drugs Bonnie with heroin before dumping her from a higher level of the prison to the floor below, a brutal end to Bonnie’s short time behind bars.

The next day, Laurie is summoned to identify her sister’s body. The official report lists a drug overdose, but the bruised, unmistakable corpse in the morgue tells a different story to Laurie. Convinced there is a cover-up, she resolves to uncover the truth, even if it means following in Bonnie’s footsteps.

Determined to get inside the prison walls herself, Laurie engineers a plan to get arrested by intentionally getting drunk, hoping to receive the same judge’s sentence—only this time, she hopes for a fair hearing. The plan works, and she faces the same sentencing judge. This time, however, the judge suspends the sentence, sparking Laurie’s outrage. She publicly insults the judge and is hauled away as his suspension is revoked.

Once inside, Laurie pieces together who is behind her sister’s death. Kay displays a cold, calculating authority, and Laurie discovers that the danger goes beyond Bonnie’s case. Kay’s grip on the prison—and her control over the guards and other inmates—creates a perilous landscape, and Laurie must navigate it carefully. The violence peaks when Laurie targets Wanda, a member of Kay’s gang, at a prison wind farm, signaling a turning point in Laurie’s quest for truth and vengeance.

A parallel thread follows Miss Dice, the head of security at the prison, who understands that corruption runs deep but has limited power to stop it. Roberta Collins plays Miss Dice, a character who becomes increasingly intrigued by Laurie’s actions and the connections between the prison system and the broader corruption outside its walls. When China, another of Kay’s henchwomen, is killed after a confrontation by the prison pool and Star dies from injuries after a fight in a shower, Dice begins to see the pattern forming and asks Kay what is really going on. Kay, wary and evasive, denies knowing the full truth, especially about Bonnie. As the body count rises, two more of Kay’s lieutenants die at Laurie’s hands, setting the stage for a final confrontation.

In the climactic showdown, Kay realizes that Laurie is the sister of Bonnie, and the revelation changes the dynamic between them. Kay tries to downplay Bonnie’s death as a mere accident and insists that her crew only roughed her up a bit, but Laurie’s anger and training as a stuntwoman give her the edge in combat. Laurie wrestles with whether to deliver a fatal blow, but in a moment of internal struggle, she cannot bring herself to kill Kay. She defeats Kay in hand-to-hand combat, leaving her battered on the floor.

Just then, Miss Dice appears, armed with a shotgun, and orders Laurie to stand down. Kay, still dangerous, rises with a wrench, ready to strike again. Miss Dice fires, striking Kay in the chest and saving Laurie. The brutal truth of Bonnie’s death and the corruption surrounding it become clear in a final, piercing exchange. Miss Dice looks at Laurie with sympathy and asks, “Did it bring Bonnie back?” Laurie can only respond with a heavy silence, realizing that the answer is likely no. “You have the rest of your life to think about that,” Dice adds, acknowledging the long road Laurie now faces.

The film closes on a quiet, redemptive note as Laurie is picked up by her boyfriend and begins a new life outside the prison walls, free to rebuild what was lost and to carry the memory of Bonnie with her.