Marshal W.T. O'Neil (Sean Connery) is the new security guy on Con-Am 25 and little does he know that his wife Carroll and son Paul have both left to go back to Earth. Con-Am is a corporation that mines the moon of Jupiter for titanium ore and business is booming on Con-Am 25 all thanks to the leadership of General Manager Sheppard (Peter Boyle).
Essentially High Noon on a moon orbiting Jupiter Outland is one of the best cheaply made sci-fi films available.
Employees have begun killing themselves and going nuts mysteriously and it seems O'Neil is the only one willing to investigate the problem. Assisted by the crotchety Dr. Lazarus, O'Neil discovers that the problem is a amphetamine that is being secretly shipped into the base.
The problem is the amphetamine may cause insanity, but it also helps a worker get 9 hours of drilling in a 6 hour shift. So everyone has been looking the other way, including his "deputy". After an unsuccessful attempt to bribe the Marshal, Sheppard realizes that O'Neil is not playing hard to get, but he intends to lock his ass away. Sheppard calls higher up in the company and has two of the most capable assassins sent to the compound to take care of O'Neil. Left on a base determined to prove that he isn't a coward or a bad cop he faces death without any assistance from his fellow security men that, "are shit."
Connery delivers a believable performance as an aging bad-ass that knows that sometimes a man's got to do what a man's got to do.