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DIE HARD meets THE BLUE LAGOON.
Sergeant Major Derrick Morton has just retired from the Special Forces after 20 years in the Army. Denise McConnell and Star Weaver are leaving Broadway for Hollywood, the triple-threat performers (can sing, dance, and act) frustrated after two years of bit parts, car show modeling, and countless rejections. And Willa LaFella wants to get out of the Bahamas before her drug-lord father can kill her.
Morton leaves Kosovo and boards the cruise ship FANTASY in Greece, eager to begin his first vacation since graduating boot camp. McConnell and Weaver are already on board, earning money for their Hollywood move while enjoying a working vacation as part of the FANTASY’s Las Vegas review. Willa does not come aboard until the FANTASY reaches the Bahamas, only a select few of the FANTASY’s crew even aware she is a passenger.
Willa recently discovered her father, Jesada LaFella, murdered her mother when Willa was a young child. Now the beautiful but willful (i.e., spoiled) Willa wants to stick it to Jesada. She has agreed to turn over evidence smuggled out of her family’s compound to the United States Drug Enforcement Agency, if the DEA can get her out of the Bahamas and place her in their Witness Protection Program. Unfortunately Jesada discovers the deal and orders Willa’s sadistic older brother, Murder, to find and kill her before she can give the DEA this evidence.
A DEA decoy on board a private jet detours Murder, but his connections steer him to the FANTASY before the cruise ship has sailed less than a day from the Bahamas. Murder and his men attempt to raid the FANTASY, but the raid goes sour and the ship is soon aflame. As things work out, Morton finds himself abandoning ship in a dinghy accompanied by McConnell, Weaver, and Willa.
Morton guides the dinghy to an unpopulated tropical island where most of the film takes place. He secures shelter then makes signals for the rescue planes he is certain will begin searching the area within a few hours, certainly no more than a few days. Willa never mentions the danger she is in…until Morton, McConnell, and Weaver think help has arrived. By then it is almost too late for Morton, handicapped because he suddenly finds himself safeguarding the three women, to ambush Jesada’s search party.
Morton has no way of knowing if more of Jesada’s men will arrive before a rescue party does. "We could try to sail to the mainland, but we’d be sitting ducks out on the water if they find us." Stuck between a rock and a hard place until a genuine rescue party arrives, Morton decides to make a stand on the island. First matter of business: turn his handicap into an advantage. "Ladies," he announces to an astonished McConnell, Weaver, and Willa, "welcome to the United States Special Forces. You are about to become lean, mean, fighting machines, or die trying. And I do mean die, because I have no intention of cashing in my chips on this God-forsaken chunk of real estate. So if you don’t do what I say when I say it, I’ll kill you myself and save Willa’s father the trouble."
The sergeant major dubs his recruits Arthos, Parthos, and Aramis. "You shall become the Three Musketeers. You shall learn to depend on each." While Murder leads the search for his missing sister, Morton puts his Musketeers through the 100% hell of intense Special Forces training, pushing them to their mental and physical limits while teaching the women survival and combat skills. Morton also prepares traps throughout the island, just in case Jesada’s men arrive before a rescue party.
For their part the women do train hard, though not always willingly, and after a few days it appears Morton’s plan may have a chance of succeeding. And, as the days pass, each woman begins to find herself resenting Morton less and being more attracted to him. "He is the only game in town," McConnell confesses to Weaver, who in turn tells her friend, "And it’s a game I wouldn’t mind winning."
But, all too soon, Murder and more of Jesada’s killers locate the island, and the time arrives for Morton and his Musketeers to defend their island. "It’s kill or be killed, soldiers," Morton tells the women. "You can do this. Trust in me, your comrades, and most of all yourself, and we’ll see this thing through." Brave words, but, if truth were known, Morton gives them less than a 50% chance of surviving.