Tom Skerritt plays Dude Donaldson: dressed as rodeo clowns, he and an accomplice rob a rodeo (rather brutally, killing half-a-dozen people). Cannon is summoned to figure out what's going on, after authorites spend 6 weeks and come up with nothing. There's a home movie taken at the time of the robbery, in the vicinity of the buliding... Cannon and the others watch this film over and over, like the Zapruder film, and eventually it dawns on Cannon that the clowns may be involved. He tracks a clown suit to a Texan who died in Vietnam the previous winter... the man's widow (Sharon Acker) is less than forthcoming... though her young son (Vincent Van Patten) gives Cannon some leads... Skerritt took the suit from the widow's barn and used it in the robbery. Skerritt goes to Acker's house and threatens her and her son against saying anything to Cannon...Cannon senses what's going on, and after almost being snipered by Skerritt...finally subdues him with a bear hug.
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