Tuesday's Overlooked TV Movie: The Blue Lightning

You've probably figured out by now that I'm a Sam Elliott fan. In this TV movie from 1986, he plays a private eye named Harry Wingate (good name for a PI) who's on the trail of a fabulously valuable opal known as the Blue Lightning. His search leads him to Australia, where he winds up tangling with a villainous former IRA gunman (played by Robert Culp), who has taken over a small settlement in the Outback. So, yeah, it plays a lot like a Western, but you don't think I'm going to complain about that, do you? I haven't seen this movie since it was new, but I remember enjoying it. The whole thing is posted on YouTube, so you can check it out for yourself, if you're of a mind to and have better Internet service than I do.