A United States Coast Guard vessel intercepts and boards an American yacht in the Caribbean Sea and finds evidence that the ship's owner and passengers, American businessman Peter Hardin and his family, were murdered by the piloting Colombian crew. CIA analyst Jack Ryan learns that Hardin was laundering money for the South American Cali Cartel, the leader of which, Ernesto Escobedo, ordered Hardin's murder for embezzling millions in drug profits. U.S. President Bennett, Hardin's close friend, discreetly authorizes National Security Advisor James Cutter to initiate covert operations in Colombia to destroy the cartel. Ryan is appointed acting Deputy Director of Intelligence when Admiral James Greer undergoes treatment for pancreatic cancer. Ryan requests Congress to increase funding to support Colombians fighting the drug cartels, giving his assurance there is no U.S. military involvement, unaware that Cutter will use the funds to assemble RECIPROCITY, a special forces team recruited by CIA operative John Clark and aided by Robert Ritter, the CIA Deputy Director of Operations. President Bennett sends Ryan to negotiate with the Colombian government to allow the United States to seize Escobedo's assets, including $650 million hidden in off-shore accounts, while Escobedo's intelligence officer, Colonel Félix Cortez, secretly orders the Cartel to ambush Ryan's convoy. Ryan survives the fracas, though several colleagues are killed, including Dan Murray and FBI Director Emile Jacobs. Cortez's identity is ascertained after he murders Jacobs’ secretary, Moira, who was an unwitting informant. Blamed for the attack, Escobedo organizes a meeting with the other Cartel heads. RECIPROCITY discovers this and launches an airstrike on their gathering, though Escobedo and Cortez, en route, barely escape unscathed. Cortez learns Americans were responsible and brokers a deal with Cutter: Cortez will kill Escobedo to assume leadership, then will reduce drug shipments to the U.S. and allow American law enforcement to make regular arrests to influence public opinion on the United States’ declared war on drugs. As part of the exchange, Cortez wants the location of RECIPROCITY disclosed to him and all CIA support to RECIPROCITY eliminated. Clark's team is stranded when Cutter accepts Cortez's deal, and are overwhelmed by Cortez's mercenaries in the jungle. U.S. surveillance monitored Cutter’s conversation with Cortez unbeknownst to him and Ryan accesses Ritter's computer to obtain evidence regarding the illegal Colombian operations. Ritter, however, warns Ryan that because he secured funding for the operation, Congress will hold Ryan solely responsible, revealing that he and Cutter have been granted President Bennett's pre-emptive pardons from any wrongdoing. Greer succumbs to his illness and Ryan flies to Bogota after the funeral to seek out Clark, unaware Cutter and Ritter have led Clark to believe that Ryan betrayed RECIPROCITY. Clark captures Ryan, but teams up with him when he realizes Ritter and Cutter played them both. Ryan and Clark procure a helicopter and fly to RECIPROCITY's last known position, where they find team sniper Chavez, who reports that most members were killed, and learn Captain Ramirez and one remaining squad member were captured. Ryan meets with Escobedo and informs him of Cortez's deception, while Clark simultaneously commences the rescue of his men who are being held captive in a coffee facility fronting Escobedo's cocaine operation. Escobedo confronts Cortez but is killed by Cortez's associate. Chavez kills Cortez during the escape, and Ryan narrowly escapes along with Clark and the freed prisoners. Back in the United States, Ryan refuses President Bennett's request to help cover up the conspiracy and instead testifies before the Congressional Oversight Committee about the recent events.

The pregnant Bride and her groom rehearse their wedding. Bill — the Bride's former lover, and the leader of the Deadly Viper Assassination Squad — arrives unexpectedly and orders the Deadly Vipers to kill everyone at the wedding rehearsal. Bill shoots the Bride in the head, but she survives and swears revenge. Four years later, the Bride, having already assassinated Deadly Vipers O-Ren Ishii and Vernita Green, goes to the trailer of Bill's brother Budd, another Deadly Viper, planning to ambush him. Having been warned by Bill beforehand, he incapacitates her with a non-lethal shotgun blast of rock salt and sedates her. He calls Elle Driver, another former Deadly Viper, and arranges to sell her the Bride's sword for $1 million. He seals the Bride inside a coffin and buries her alive. Years earlier, Bill tells the young Bride of the legendary martial arts master Pai Mei and his Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique, a death blow that Pai refuses to teach his students; properly used, the attack is reputed to leave an opponent able to take only five steps before dying. Bill takes the Bride to Pai's temple for training. Pai ridicules and torments her during training, but she eventually gains his respect. In the present, the Bride uses Pai's techniques to escape from the coffin and claw her way to the surface. Elle arrives at Budd's trailer and kills him with a black mamba hidden within the case full of money for the sword. She calls Bill and tells him that the Bride has killed Budd and that she has killed the Bride, using the Bride's real name: Beatrix Kiddo. As Elle exits the trailer, Beatrix ambushes her and they fight. Elle, who was also taught by Pai, taunts Beatrix by revealing that she killed Pai by poisoning his favorite meal in retribution for him plucking out her eye after she called him "a miserable old fool". Enraged, Beatrix plucks out Elle's remaining eye, blinding her, and leaves her screaming and stumbling in the trailer with the black mamba. In Acuña, Mexico, Beatrix meets a retired pimp, Esteban Vellajo, who helps her find Bill. She tracks him to his home, and discovers that their daughter B. B. is still alive, now four years old. Beatrix spends the evening with them. After she puts B. B. to bed, Bill shoots Beatrix with a dart containing truth serum and interrogates her. She explains that she left the Deadly Vipers when she discovered she was pregnant, in order to give B. B. a better life. Bill explains that he assumed she was dead; he ordered her assassination when he discovered she was alive and engaged to a "jerk" he assumed was the father of her child. The two begin to fight, but Beatrix traps Bill's sword in her scabbard and strikes him with the Five Point Palm Exploding Heart Technique. Surprised that Pai taught her the attack, Bill reconciles with her, then falls dead as she walks away. Beatrix leaves with B. B. to start a new life.

In 1973, sports handicapper and Mafia associate Sam "Ace" Rothstein is sent by the Chicago Outfit to Las Vegas to run the Tangiers Casino, with frontman Philip Green. He soon doubles the casino's profits, with a portion of the earned cash profits skimmed directly from the casino count room and delivered to the Midwest Mafia bosses. Chicago boss Remo Gaggi sends mob enforcer, and Ace's childhood friend, Nicky Santoro to help him protect their cash skim and the casino's workings as well as Ace himself. Nicky recruits his younger brother Dominick and right-hand man Frankie Marino after he is listed in the Black Book to gather an experienced crew, not just to safeguard the casino but also to engage in shakedowns and jewelry burglaries for their own gain. Nicky's criminal activities in Las Vegas start drawing too much media and police attention Ace meets and falls in love with beautiful con artist, showgirl, and former prostitute Ginger McKenna. They have a daughter, Amy, and marry. He entrusts Ginger with $2 million in cash and $1 million in jewelry. Still, their marriage is soon thrown into turmoil due to Ginger's relationship with Lester Diamond, a hustler and pimp who is also her longtime ex-lover. Eventually, Ace arranges for Nicky and his crew to beat up Lester when they catch him accepting $25,000 from her in a cafe. In 1976, Ace fires slot manager Don Ward for incompetence. Ward is brother-in-law to Clark County Commission chairman Pat Webb, who cannot convince Ace to re-hire him. Webb gets Ace's gaming license denied, jeopardizing the latter's position. Ace insults the board and local politicians in the license hearing, creating a spectacle for the news cameras, which brings unwanted media attention onto the casino. Since Ace is disallowed from legally running the casino, he begins hosting a local television talk show inside the casino, irritating the bosses back home for bringing more unneeded attention to their business. Ace blames Nicky's reckless lawbreaking for the ongoing pressure from police and state government, which leads to an argument between Ace and Nicky in the desert, concluding with threats by Nicky. Ace's renewed attempts to get Nicky to leave Las Vegas only strain their friendship more. In 1980, Ace contemplates divorcing Ginger as their marriage appears to collapse. She later kidnaps Amy and plans on fleeing to Europe with her and Lester. When Ace finds out about her plan, he convinces Ginger to return with Amy. Later on that night, he catches Ginger phoning a hit on him and responds by kicking her out of their home; she then returns home and Ace reluctantly decides to forgive her and give their marriage another chance. Ginger confides in Nicky about the situation, and they start an affair. Ace soon finds out, as do private investigators. Nicky ends things with Ginger once she asks him to kill Ace, while also threatening to go to the FBI about their criminal activities. She then leaves Ace, with all of her money and jewelry, only to later get arrested by the FBI not long afterwards. In 1982, the FBI discovers Artie's records which he had kept after being put in charge by the Midwest Bosses to oversee the skimming operation after it was discovered that people on the inside were skimming their skim. The FBI closes the Tangiers, and convinces Green to cooperate. They approach Ace for help, showing him photos of Nicky and Ginger together, but he turns them down. The Chicago bosses are arrested and prepare for their arraignment. Following Gaggi's directive, they arrange hits on everyone involved in the casino operation who could possibly testify against them. In 1983, Ginger, whose personal fortune has been squandered by lowlife associates, is killed with a "hot dose" in Los Angeles. That same year, Ace narrowly survives a car bomb, and suspects Nicky to be the man responsible for it as the attempt was not professional enough for the bosses to have ordered it. Ace plans to confront Nicky, but never gets the chance to do so when the bosses - finally fed up with the extent of Nicky's reckless criminality - arrange to have Nicky and Dominick killed in 1986; the two brothers are ambushed by Frank and their own crew, brutally beaten with baseball bats, and buried alive in a shallow grave in a remote Illinois cornfield. A coda depicts the Mafia pushed out of the casino industry by big corporations, which purchase and demolish nearly all the old casinos. New, even more glamorous casinos are built, which are impersonal and cold, a development lamented by the narrator. Because he remains a reliable, high-stakes earner for the outfit, Ace Rothstein is allowed to live; he moves to San Diego and resumes sports handicapping.

In post-Soviet Russia, civil war erupts as a result of the ongoing conflict in Chechnya. Military units loyal to Vladimir Radchenko, a Russian ultra-nationalist rebel, take control of a nuclear missile installation in the Russian Far East near the Chinese and North Korean borders and threaten nuclear war if confronted. USS Alabama, a U.S. Navy submarine, is dispatched on patrol with orders to launch a pre-emptive nuclear strike if Radchenko fuels his missiles. Combat-hardened veteran Captain Frank Ramsey chooses Lieutenant Commander Ron Hunter, who has an extensive education in military history and tactics but no combat experience, as his new XO. Tensions arise between the headstrong Ramsey and the more analytical and cautious Hunter, exacerbated by Ramsey's decision to order a missile drill amidst the chaos caused by a galley fire that results in the death of the chief mess officer. Hunter helps fight the fire and discreetly questions the decision but is chastised by Ramsey for the appearance of discord. Alabama receives an Emergency Action Message ordering a missile launch against the Russian base. As Alabama prepares to fire, a second radio message is detected before a rebel Russian Akula -class submarine attacks, damaging the boat’s radio and leaving the message incomplete. With the last confirmed order being to launch, Ramsey decides to proceed. Hunter disagrees, believing the partial second message may be a retraction. When Hunter refuses to consent as is required for a launch to be authorized, Ramsey tries to relieve him of duty. Hunter orders Ramsey arrested for attempting to circumvent two-man protocol. The Chief of the Boat sides with Hunter and has Ramsey relieved of command and confined to his stateroom, putting Hunter in charge. The Russian submarine attacks Alabama again. Alabama emerges victorious but is damaged when a torpedo detonates next to her hull. The main propulsion system is disabled, and the bilge bay begins flooding. As the crew tries to restore propulsion, Hunter orders the sealing of the bilge with sailors trapped inside, saving Alabama at the expense of the men. Propulsion is restored before Alabama reaches hull-crush depth. Officers and crew loyal to Ramsey unite and stage a mutiny. They retake the control room, confining Hunter, the Chief of the Boat, and some others to the officers' mess. Repairs to the radio continue, but Ramsey is determined to proceed without waiting for verification. Hunter escapes his arrest and prepares to retake the ship. He gains the support of weapons officer Peter Ince in the missile control room, further delaying the launch and leading Ramsey to go there. Hunter's party storms Alabama' s command center, removing the captain's missile key. Ramsey and his men return, resulting in an armed Mexican standoff. With news that the radio will soon be repaired, Ramsey and Hunter agree to wait until the deadline for a preemptive missile launch to be effective. Communications are eventually restored, revealing the full message from the second transmission – a retraction ordering that the missile launch be aborted because Radchenko's rebellion has been quelled. Ramsey turns the conn over to Hunter and returns to his cabin. The two men are put before a tribunal at Naval Station Pearl Harbor to answer for their actions. The tribunal concludes that both men were right and both men were wrong, and Hunter's actions were deemed lawfully justified and in the best interests of the United States. Unofficially, the tribunal reprimands both men for failing to resolve their differences. Thanks to Ramsey's personal recommendation, the tribunal agrees to grant Hunter command of his own sub while allowing Ramsey to save face via an early retirement with full honors. Outside, Hunter meets with Ramsey to express his gratitude, and the two men part ways amicably. A textual epilogue states that as of January 1996, only the President has the authority to launch nuclear missiles.

In 1995, obese high school senior Chris Brander is secretly in love with his classmate and best friend Jamie Palamino. Confessing his feelings by writing in her yearbook, he attends their graduation party. As he returns Jamie's yearbook, it is swapped by her ex-boyfriend, Tim, who reads the declaration aloud to everyone, humiliating Chris. After kissing him on the cheek, Jamie admits she does not reciprocate his affections. He leaves the party in tears, announcing he will never return, and vows to be more successful than everyone else. Ten years later, a womanizing Chris has lost weight and lives in Los Angeles as a successful record producer and vice president of the company. Before Christmas, company CEO KC asks him to accompany emerging pop singer Samantha James to Paris so she signs with their label, and Chris reluctantly complies. While she wants a relationship with him, he has no interest after their only date previously led to his hospitalization. On the way to Paris, Samantha accidentally sets her private jet on fire, causing an emergency landing in New Jersey, near Chris' hometown. Chris takes Samantha to his mother's for the night and re-engages with his teenage past, including his unresolved feelings for Jamie. She meets his mother and 18-year-old brother Mike, a fan of Samantha. At a bar, he also sees Jamie, working as a bartender to pay for graduate school for teaching. Chris asks Mike to keep Samantha busy during his date with Jamie, but realizing their platonic friendship is important to him hampers his plan for them to have sex. During a friendly ice skating "day date", Chris is taken away in an ambulance after injuring himself during a hockey game. At the scene, Jamie is reunited with Dusty Dinkleman, a paramedic and former high school classmate also in love with her. Realizing Dusty only wants revenge sex with her, Chris tries to warn Jamie but instead attacks Dusty in front of her. She refuses to listen when he tries to explain. Consequently, he gets drunk and goes to Jamie's bar, finding her there with Dusty. When she gently declines Dusty's sexual advances, he storms out. Chris and Jamie get into another fight, where he blames her for keeping him in the friend zone and says she will never amount to anything. Furious, Jamie strikes Chris and he is tossed out. Upon returning to Los Angeles and rejecting Samantha again, Chris realizes that Jamie is his true love. He returns to New Jersey, apologizes to her, and declares his love before they kiss.

While working with a team from the University of Chicago on a project to convert hydrogen from water into clean energy, student machinist Eddie Kasalivich inadvertently discovers a sound frequency in his home laboratory that perfectly stabilizes their process the next day. As the team celebrates with a party at the project laboratory, Dr. Paul Shannon, the leader of the project, and Dr. Alistair Barkley, the project manager, debate whether or not to share the scientific discovery. Later that night, project physicist Dr. Lily Sinclair finds her car unable to start, so Eddie gets her home by bus. Back in the laboratory, Alistair and assistant Dr. Lu Chen prepare to upload their discovery to the Internet to share the breakthrough with the world, while a van approaches the premises. Chen hears a noise and goes outside to investigate, but is kidnapped by unknown assailants as Alistair is also attacked. Once he has dropped Lily off at Alistair's house, where she lives on the third floor, Eddie returns to the laboratory to retrieve his motorcycle but notices a suspicious van departing. Hearing alarms, he runs inside to find Alistair dead with a plastic bag over his head and Chen missing. As the hydrogen reactor has become dangerously unstable, Eddie, unable to deactivate it, speeds away as a concealed detonator triggers a massive hydrogen explosion that destroys the laboratory and eight blocks' worth of surrounding streets. Upon returning from questioning by the FBI, Eddie and Lily realize that they are being framed after encountering planted evidence in both of their houses. The two flee to an observatory in Wisconsin belonging to Maggie McDermott, an old friend of Eddie's. After resting up, they contact Paul but are almost caught and narrowly escape. As the pair are evading more police, Paul meets with Lyman Earl Collier at the C-Systems Research complex, where it is revealed that C-Systems orchestrated the plot to destroy the laboratory and frame the pair for it, with Lyman ordering the attack. Despite some disagreement, Paul and Lyman decide to continue hunting for the pair, a task facilitated when Eddie covertly arranges a meeting with Paul. At their rendezvous, Paul reveals his involvement in framing Eddie, but the meeting ends in an ambush in which Lyman's thugs Yusef Reed and Clancy Butler, who murdered Alistair, capture Lily while Eddie barely escapes. After tracing the license plate on the thugs' van, Eddie tracks them to the secret C-Systems Research facility where Paul and Lyman are forcing Lily and Chen to replicate the project. When C-Systems' test reactor malfunctions, Paul, the scientists and the prisoners all depart, allowing Eddie to furtively "fix" the system that night. The next morning, one of the other scientists discovers the working reactor and everyone celebrates. A suspicious Paul immediately obtains a download of the fusion data, and secretly gives it to his assistant, Anita, for safekeeping. He then encounters Eddie at a computer in the company boardroom, who demands his release for making the reactor work. Paul agrees but Lyman refuses, so Eddie sets the reactor to explode while sending proof of his innocence to the FBI and blueprints of the reactor to "hopefully a couple thousand" international scientists. Lyman responds by shooting Chen dead, then locking in Eddie and Lily to die in the explosion as he, Paul, and their staff flee the site. Lyman is given a falsified copy of the fusion data before Paul kills him for overstepping the bounds of the program, leaving his body in an elevator. During his own escape, he deactivates the containment system, allowing Eddie and Lily to escape. They are attacked by Reed and Butler over an ascending construction lift but escape by climbing aboard it moments before a blast wave sweeps through the complex, incinerating the corpses of Reed, Butler, and Lyman. Having survived the shockwave, Eddie and Lily are met by FBI agents Ford and Doyle, now convinced of their innocence, who take them to safety. Paul is shown dictating a memo to Anita in a chauffeured limo, informing the Director of the CIA that "...C-System no longer a viable entity." In a post-credits scene, the C-Systems facility is seen imploding into the landscape.

An unnamed country is ruled by a petulant tyrant named Maximilian II (often called Junior) whose primary interests include selfish pleasure, micromanaging the country’s schlocky film industry, and enjoying sexual games with his beautiful, yet cruel, wife Josephine. His regime is barely tolerated due to the violence dealt by anti-government terrorists. One such subversive revolutionary, a dissident philosopher and playwright named John Thorne, is held in a state prison, where he is guarded by a man named Joe. Joe comes to learn from Thorne and respect him for his bearing and intellect, if not his message. Junior, trying to quash spiraling dissent, takes the risk of letting Thorne out of jail, hoping to have him become not a great folk hero but another greedy, dishonest politician. Joe, too, is soon promoted to one of the guards at the palace and a position in the country's elite military unit, where he becomes so disgusted by the excesses of Junior and Josephine that he allows Thorne and his followers to enter the palace and kill them. Thorne becomes the new ruler, with an even more totalitarian regime. His government encourages separating children from their parents, imposes veganism, bans action movies, oppresses women, and eliminates imported medicine all while sending the country's professional classes to grim re-education camps. For his assistance in assassinating the dictator, Joe is hailed as a hero by Thorne. Nevertheless, as Joe realizes that his one-time friend is just as bad as, if not worse than, his predecessor, he refuses to ally with the new regime. For this, Thorne sends Joe to a re-education camp.Subjected to numerous beatings and isolation, he continually refuses to sign his loyalty oath. His psyche begins to dramatically deteriorate as he is interrogated and tortured, seemingly discovering layers of bizarre hidden conspiracy within the camp and the broader regime of his former friend. Thorne is killed in his bath by one of his once loyal followers. The revolutionary government is quickly overthrown. Junior's in-laws and nephew are revealed to have escaped during Thorne's revolution and, having lived in exile, have returned to re-establish the old government, and former collaborators and torturers return to civilian life. Joe’s legal case remains in limbo for having destroyed the old government, but also never having 'played ball' with the new one, so he remains in prison indefinitely. Twelve years later, he writes his memoirs while under house arrest, his sanity possibly still shattered.

Film producer James Ballard and his wife, Catherine, are in an open marriage. The couple engages in various trysts, using the intimate details of their extramarital encounters to fuel their own sexual relations. Catherine recounts a sexual encounter she had that day with a stranger in a prop plane hangar, but she was left unsatisfied. When James responds that he did not achieve satisfaction during his own encounter with a coworker due to an interruption by a film crew member, Catherine replies, "Maybe the next one." One night, while driving home from work, James's car collides head-on with another, killing its male passenger. While trapped in the fused wreckage, Dr. Helen Remington, the driver and the dead passenger's wife, exposes a breast to James as she removes the shoulder harness of her seatbelt. During his recovery, James meets Helen again and also encounters Robert Vaughan, who shows a keen interest in the brace holding James's shattered leg together. After departing the hospital, Helen and James begin an affair, driven primarily by their shared experience of the car crash. They attend one of Vaughan's cult-like performance pieces, where he meticulously recreates the car crash that killed James Dean using replica cars and stunt drivers. When Department of Transport officials break up the event, James flees with Helen and Vaughan. James soon becomes one of Vaughan's followers, who fetishize car crashes, obsessively watch car safety test videos, photograph traffic collisions, and recount the deaths of famous people in road accidents. Catherine, who has noticed Vaughan following her in his car on several occasions, begins to fantasize about him and James having sex. Although Vaughan initially claims that he is interested in the "reshaping of the human body by modern technology," his true project is living out the philosophy that the car crash is a "benevolent psychopathology that beckons toward us." James drives Vaughan's Lincoln convertible around the city while Vaughan picks up a prostitute and has sex with her in the back seat. James and Catherine have sex while Catherine fantasises about James and Vaughan having sex. Shortly after, James invites Catherine on one of his and Vaughan's drives. They see police search Vaughan's convertible in connection with a pedestrian hit-and-run, leaving Vaughan distressed. On an interstate, they come across a car wreck involving Colin Seagrave, a member of the group who had been planning to authentically recreate the car accident that killed Jayne Mansfield with Vaughan. Amongst the wreckage, the three see Colin's bloodied corpse, dressed in a blonde wig and a dress to resemble Mansfield. Vaughan photographs the scene as they pass by. James notices some unexplained blood on the fender and drives them through a car wash while Vaughan and Catherine have sex in the back seat. Back home, Catherine lies in bed with visible, though superficial, wounds from Vaughan's touch, crying while James touches her. James subsequently has a tryst with Gabrielle, another member of the group, whose legs are clad in restrictive steel braces and who has a vulva -like scar on the back of one of her thighs from a crash injury. He tears her fishnet stockings open and penetrates her scar. Later, Vaughan invites James to visit a tattooist, who inks car emblems on Vaughan's body. Afterward, James and Vaughan have sex in Vaughan's car. When Vaughan rams his car into Catherine's while it is unattended, he and James aggressively pursue each other. On an overpass, Vaughan intentionally crashes his car, landing on a passenger bus below and killing himself. After Vaughan's death, Gabrielle and Helen visit a junkyard, kissing and affectionately embracing while lying in the wreck of Vaughan's car. Later, James and Catherine perform a similar stunt, with James pursuing her at high speed on a freeway. Catherine unbuckles her seatbelt as she sees James approaching, and he rams into the back of her car, causing it to topple down into a grassy median. James exits his car and approaches Catherine's, which has flipped upside down. Catherine lies partly under the car, apparently only superficially injured. When James asks if she is okay, she tells him she is not hurt. As the couple kisses and begins to have sex partly underneath the wrecked vehicle, James whispers to a crying Catherine, "Maybe the next one."

In Northampton, in the East Midlands of England, Charlie Price is attempting to save his family's shoe factory, which has been floundering since his father's death. While on a business trip to London to sell the company's extra stock, Charlie encounters a woman being harassed by drunken hoodlums and intervenes to his detriment. He wakes up backstage, in the dressing room of Lola, a drag queen performer and alter ego of Simon. Charlie is intrigued when he sees that drag queens' high heels snap easily, and wishes to create high heels that can support a greater range of foot sizes and body types. Back in Northampton, while in the process of laying off workers, one of them, Lauren, gives Charlie the idea of looking for a niche market product to save the business. Charlie then recruits Lauren to assist him in designing a high-heeled boot for drag performers. When their initial designs are met with scorn by Lola, Charlie and Lauren bring her on as a consultant. The road is initially bumpy: many of the male employees are uncomfortable with Lola's presence and the new direction, and Charlie's relationship with his fiancée, Nicola, begins to deteriorate as she encourages him to sell the factory building to a developer. Although things improve when Lola tones down her personality and starts making friends, matters take a turn for the worse when Charlie is invited to showcase the new boots in Milan; the strain he puts on his employees causes most of them, including Lola, to walk out. Charlie's fiancée arrives at the factory, furious that he took out a second mortgage on their house to save the company. Nicola insists that he sell the company, but Charlie is determined to save it and the jobs of his employees. The argument (which ends with Nicola leaving Charlie) is broadcast on the factory's PA system, which is overheard by Lauren and Lola's bitter opponent at the factory, Don, a chauvinistic male worker. Don changes his mindset after Lola graciously allowed him to win an arm wrestling match. Don rallies the factory workers to make the boots in time for Charlie and Lauren to get to Milan. When Charlie catches Nicola with another man, he angrily takes out his frustrations on Lola, causing Lola to quit. After arriving in Milan with no one to model the boots, Charlie is forced to go onstage and model the boots himself. After he trips and ultimately falls flat on his face, Lola and her posse of drag queens arrive, put on a spectacular runway show, and save the day. In the film's denouement, Lola headlines her own show and sings a song in honour of the "kinky boots factory" of Northampton. Most of the key workers are in attendance and enjoying themselves, including Charlie and Lauren, who have become a couple.

Lars Lindstrom lives a quiet life in a small town. His mother died when he was born, causing his grief-stricken father to have been a distant parent to Lars and his older brother, Gus. Gus feels guilty for leaving as soon as he could to support himself; Lars struggles with the loss of his mother during his birth and an irrational fear about the risk of death during childbirth. As a result, he exhibits avoidance behaviors and is avoidant of touching others (haphephobia), causing social awkwardness and isolation. Having inherited the family home after their father's death, the two brothers live on the property along with Gus's wife, Karin. Lars lives in the converted garage, while Gus and Karin, who is pregnant with their first child, live in the main house. Despite Karin's efforts to bring Lars out of his shell, interacting with or relating to his family and co-workers is very difficult for him. A colleague at his office, Margo, also tries to engage him, but Lars is impervious to her attempts. One evening, Lars announces that he has a visitor whom he met online, a wheelchair-mobile missionary of Brazilian and Danish descent named Bianca. Gus and Karin are startled to discover that Bianca is actually a lifelike doll, ordered from an adult website, whom Lars treats as a live human being. Concerned about his mental health, they convince him to take Bianca to see the family doctor, Dagmar Berman, who is also a psychologist. Berman diagnoses Bianca with low blood pressure and urges Lars to return under the guise of "weekly treatments" for Bianca, while actually analyzing Lars. During this time, Margo has begun to date another co-worker, which silently bothers Lars. Lars introduces Bianca as his girlfriend to his co-workers and various townspeople. Sympathetic to Lars, the town inhabitants react to the doll as if she were real; however, in order to reduce Lars's dependence on her, they fill her "schedule" with social events and volunteer programs. When Margo reveals to Lars she has broken up with her boyfriend, he agrees to go bowling with her while Bianca attends a school board meeting; later they are joined by more friends. One morning, Gus and Karin are awakened by a panicked Lars, alarmed because Bianca is unresponsive, and she is rushed to the hospital. After Lars tells Gus and Karin that Bianca is dying, Berman explains that Lars alone has made these decisions about Bianca's future. During a last visit to the lake, Gus and Karin witness a despondent Lars in the water with a "dying" Bianca. Bianca's funeral is well-attended by the townspeople; after she is buried, Lars and Margo linger at the gravesite. When Margo suggests they catch up with the others, Lars asks if she would like to take a walk. She accepts.

The small town of Garrison, New Jersey, is home to a cadre of corrupt police officers from the NYPD 's 37th Precinct, including Lieutenant Ray Donlan, Detective Leo Crasky, and officers Gary Figgis, Jack Rucker, Frank Lagonda and Joey Randone. Exploiting a loophole to live outside of the city as "auxiliary transit cops", Donlan and his men are effectively untouchable by internal affairs, and are further protected by the local sheriff, Freddy Heflin. Having lost his hearing in one ear while rescuing a woman from the Hudson River as a young man, Heflin is unable to fulfill his lifelong dream of joining the NYPD. Donlan's nephew, Officer Murray ”Superboy” Babitch, is sideswiped by two youths while driving across the George Washington Bridge; believing one of them has a weapon, a frightened Babitch fatally shoots them both. Donlan, Rucker and Crasky try to plant a gun in the teens' car but are caught by a paramedic, leading Donlan to fake Babitch's suicide before hiding him in Garrison. Heflin discovers that Randone is having an affair with Donlan's wife Rose, but he and his deputies Cindy and Bill turn a blind eye to Donlan and his men. Heflin reconnects with Randone's wife Liz—the woman whom he saved from drowning—and they confess their feelings for each other. The cocaine -addicted Figgis is kicked out of Donlan's circle, and his house soon burns down with his girlfriend inside. Letting Figgis stay at his home, Heflin refuses to help internal affairs investigator Moe Tilden build his case against Donlan. Fearing that Babitch will expose them, Donlan and his men try to drown his nephew, who escapes and goes to Heflin for help, but flees when he sees Figgis. Unwilling to hunt down Babitch, Randone is thrown off a roof during a struggle with a violent suspect, and Donlan chooses not to save him. Tired of being pushed around by Donlan and his men, Heflin goes to Tilden but learns that the mayor, under pressure from Donlan's allies in the police union, has shut down the investigation. Stealing Tilden's discarded files, Heflin realizes that Donlan's ties to organized crime allowed him to create a safe haven in Garrison while trafficking drugs through the 37th Precinct, and he had Figgis's partner killed before he could testify against him. Bill is reluctant to become involved, and Cindy leaves for her old department, having lost faith in Heflin's leadership. Rucker tries to intimidate Heflin at a carnival's pistol game, but he is surprised to find Heflin is a crack shot, as is Lagonda after Heflin is chided by Liz for digging into Donlan. Heflin realizes that Figgis set fire to his own house, and Figgis admits that he committed insurance fraud to use the payout to leave Garrison for a new life. Convincing Rose to reveal where her nephew is hiding, Heflin takes Babitch into custody and sends Bill away for his own protection, but they are ambushed by Lagonda and Rucker, who capture Babitch and fire a gun next to Heflin's good ear. Completely deafened, Heflin follows them to Donlan's residence. In the ensuing shootout, he kills Lagonda and Rucker, but is wounded by Crasky. Figgis arrives, killing Crasky and distracting Donlan before he can shoot Heflin in the back, and Heflin fatally shoots Donlan. Driving to NYPD headquarters, Heflin and Figgis deliver Babitch to Tilden. Figgis turns state's evidence, resulting in sweeping arrests and indictments across the police union, the mob and the 37th Precinct. Recovering the hearing in his good ear, Heflin continues to serve as sheriff in Garrison.

In an English village in the 1800s, Victor Van Dort, the son of nouveau riche fish merchants, and Victoria Everglot, the neglected daughter of impoverished aristocrats, prepare for their arranged marriage, which will simultaneously raise the social class of the Van Dort family and restore the wealth of the Everglot family ("According to Plan"). Although the two are initially nervous, they become smitten and fall in love instantly when they meet; however, the nervous Victor ruins their wedding rehearsal by forgetting his vows, dropping the ring, and accidentally setting Lady Everglot's dress on fire. Fleeing to a nearby forest, Victor successfully rehearses his vows with a tree and places his wedding ring on what appears to be an upturned root. However, the "root" is revealed to be the skeletal finger of a deceased woman named Emily, who, gowned in a wedding dress, rises from the grave and proclaims herself as Victor's new wife. She spirits them both away to the Land of the Dead, a colorful and whimsical realm in which the spirits of the deceased reside. During his time with Emily, Victor learns that she was murdered years earlier on the night of her elopement by her fiancé, who stole the family jewels and gold she had brought (" Remains of the Day "). She reunites him with his long-dead dog Scraps, and they bond. However, desperate to return to Victoria, Victor tricks Emily into returning them to the Land of the Living by claiming he wants her to meet his parents. Emily brings Victor to see Elder Gutknecht, the kindly ruler of the underworld, who grants them temporary passage. Victor reunites with Victoria and confesses his wish to marry her as soon as possible. Before they can share a kiss, Emily discovers them and drags Victor back to the Land of the Dead, feeling betrayed and hurt ("Tears to Shed"). Victoria tries to tell her parents and the village pastor of Victor's situation, but nobody believes her. Assuming Victor has left her, Victoria's parents decide to marry her against her will to Lord Barkis Bittern, a presumed-wealthy visitor who appeared at the wedding rehearsal. After reconciling with Emily, Victor learns of Victoria's impending marriage to Barkis from his family's newly deceased coachman Mayhew. Upset over this news, he decides to marry Emily properly after overhearing Elder Gutknecht tell her that due to Victor still being alive while she is dead, her accidental marriage to Victor is nullified by default. He knows that this will require him to repeat his wedding vows with her in the Land of the Living and drink the poison 'the Wine of Ages' in order to join Emily in death. The dead swiftly prepare for the ceremony and head "upstairs" ("The Wedding Song"). There, the village erupts into a temporary panic upon their arrival, until the living recognize their departed loved ones and joyously reunite with them. The chaos causes a panicked Barkis to expose his own poor financial standing and his intentions to marry Victoria only for her supposed wealth, leading her to reject him. Victoria witnesses Victor and Emily's wedding as Victor completes his vows and prepares to drink the poison, only for Emily to stop him when she realizes she is denying Victoria her chance to live happily with him. Just as Emily reunites Victor and Victoria, Barkis arrives to kidnap Victoria; Emily recognizes Barkis as both her previous fiancé and murderer. Victor duels with Barkis to protect Victoria, and Emily intervenes to save Victor's life. Accepting defeat, Barkis mockingly toasts Emily for dying unwed and unwittingly drinks the poison, causing him to die. This allows the dead – who cannot interfere in the affairs of the living – to take retribution against him for his crimes. Emily, now freed from her torment, releases Victor of his vow to marry her and returns his ring, so he can marry Victoria. As she steps into the moonlight, she dissolves into a swarm of butterflies that fly into the sky as Victor and Victoria watch and embrace.