The Patriot(1998)

After Wesley (Steven Seagal) gets Holly (Camilla Belle) over to Grandpa’s (Leonard Mountain Chief) house in an effort to keep her safe from a potential attack from Chisholm (Gailard Sartain) and his militia, they are greeted at the door by a family friend, Dr. Ann White Cloud (Whitney Yellow Robe), and she decides to help Wesley figure out a way to cure the N.A.M.-37 virus that is strangling the town of Ennis. As they do some work using samples of both Ann’s and Holly’s blood, Wesley points out to Ann that – like Holly – she hasn’t gotten sick, which he thought for sure would happen given the fact that she lives downwind from Ennis and has been exposed. He soon decides that he needs to get out of Grandpa’s house and into a secret facility in the hills that he knows about that has a good laboratory (which he later reveals he knows about because he worked there for a year in the past), and Ann decides to come along with him both because she knows her way around a laboratory herself and because she believes that Wesley will need an extra pair of hands. They find the facility, and using a forged DARPA identification card that he earlier created on his computer back at his ranch, Wesley gets himself and Ann past the front gate. They then go inside and find the facility guarded by just six soldiers, who are the only survivors of the virus left at the base but are also infected themselves. After Wesley convinces the lieutenant that he is here to help them, he and Ann go into his old lab and get to work. Back in Ennis, Chisholm leaves the hospital (which has been serving as his militia’s headquarters when they took over Ennis shortly after the outbreak began) and returns to his compound, wanting to continue his negotiations with government officials to end the standoff from there, and he brings his right-hand man Pogue (Silas Weir Mitchell) and several of his militia members with him. The rest of the militia are left to continue watching the town, although they – like Chisholm and Pogue – are all slowly dying from the virus, too.

Over the next couple of days, Wesley and Ann work long hours and conduct several experiments to find a cure, but despite their best efforts, the soldiers steadily succumb to the virus until only the lieutenant is left. However, on the third day, Wesley notices that the lieutenant appears to be healing up, and Ann shows him that the lieutenant has been drinking wildflower tea since yesterday, which is the same stuff that they have been drinking regularly. After remembering how Holly has been drinking this tea as well, Wesley realizes that these wildflowers – which are known to Native American healers – contain the cure, so they boil some of the flowers in liquid, turn it into a vaccine, and then inject it into the lieutenant’s veins. Sometime later, Ann brings the lieutenant before Wesley to show him that, thanks to this new vaccine, he is recuperating and will live. Now knowing what he must do, he and Ann bid the lieutenant farewell and return to Grandpa’s house, where Wesley tells Holly that they are heading back home now.

Wesley and Holly return to their ranch, but shortly after their return, they are both captured by Chisholm’s militia. The soldiers take them to Chisholm’s compound, where Wesley is brought before Chisholm while Holly is imprisoned in the basement. During a conversation they have, where they go back and forth with their viewpoints on Chisholm’s agenda and Wesley tells him that no sane person would unleash a biochemical agent that can kill millions, Chisholm extends an offer to Wesley to join his army so they can find a cure for the virus together. Wesley informs him that he has already developed a cure, and Chisholm shows off his handgun to him and tells him to do his Hippocratic duty and help him. They then have a drink of Merlot to celebrate Wesley’s discovery, but while the sickly Chisholm is preoccupied with trying drink from his glass, Wesley takes the opportunity to break his own glass at the stem and then drive the broken stem into Chisholm’s head, killing him. He then takes Chisholm’s gun and starts killing the militia members that come into the room to investigate the noise, but then he hears Holly scream and goes down into the basement to find an armed Pogue holding her hostage. Pogue forces Wesley to drop his weapon, but moments later, Wesley manages to snatch Pogue’s gun away from him and then knock him out. He and Holly then flee the compound and return home.

Wesley contacts Colonel Harvey (Robert Harvey) – the commander of the soldiers watching all of Ennis’ entry and exit points – and lets him know that he has found a cure for the virus and that its compounds come from wildflowers. Soldiers in Hazmat suits are then shown going into a field full of these wildflowers and collecting as many as they can, and then we see a military helicopter picking up Wesley and Holly at their ranch and taking them into town. After they get dropped off outside the hospital, another chopper passes overhead and announces to the people of Ennis that the standoff has ended, and moments later, they proceed to scatter the wildflowers from the chopper all around town. They tell the townsfolk that the flowers will stop the virus, then instruct them to collect them, boil them into a liquid, drink it, and then wait for the medical teams that will be arriving shortly. Grandpa and Ann are then seen making their arrival outside the hospital to look at the success of Wesley’s mission.