A team of special force ops, led by a tough but fair soldier, Major "Dutch" Schaefer, are ordered to assist CIA man, Colonel Al Dillon, on a rescue mission for potential survivors of a Helicopter downed over remote South American jungle. Not long after they land, Dutch and his team discover that they have been sent in under false pretenses. This deception turns out to be the least of their worries though, when they find themselves being methodically hunted by something not of this world.

Mike Harrigan (Danny Glover), a brash policeman who is fighting drug lords in a decaying L.A. finds that the criminals are being killed in a very odd fashion. The federal authorities keep telling him to stay out, even though his own men are also being killed. He catches sight of a nearly invisible alien hunter (Kevin Peter Hall) who is searching for trophies. Harrigan injures the creature and pursues it, becoming the hunter.