In 1850 Oregon Territory, backwoodsman Adam Pontipee goes to town for supplies and to find a bride. He meets Milly, the pretty young cook at the town bar. Seeing her strength, hardworking attitude, and culinary skills, he proposes. She accepts and they immediately marry, but upon arriving at the Pontipee mountain homestead, Milly discovers that Adam has six younger brothers—Benjamin, Caleb, Daniel, Ephraim, Frank, and Gideon—who are uncouth and expect Milly to clean and cook for them. Milly angrily ruins dinner and retreats to the bedroom, where she bans Adam from their bed. Adam, unwilling to go back downstairs and face his brothers' mockery, crawls out the window to sleep in a nearby tree; eventually, Milly and Adam reconcile, with Milly regretting her high hopes concerning marriage. Milly begins teaching Adam's brothers hygiene and manners; eventually, this extends to advice on romance and courtship. At a town barn-raising event, the Pontipees display their newly acquired social graces as they meet Dorcas, Ruth, Martha, Liza, Sarah, and Alice, who are immediately attracted to the brothers. The women's initial suitors, overcome with jealousy, attack the Pontipees during the barn-raising. Although they keep their tempers initially, they fight back when Adam is attacked unprovoked. In the ensuing brawl, the barn is destroyed. As winter sets in, the brothers pine for their loves back in town. To console them, Adam reads from Milly's copy of Plutarch 's Parallel Lives about the Sabine women, whom the ancient Romans kidnapped to be their wives. Adam then claims his brothers should do the same to get their prospective brides. The Pontipees sneak into town at night and kidnap the women. As they race back to the homestead, the brothers trigger an avalanche that blocks the mountain pass, stopping their pursuers. However, the Pontipees realize they neglected to procure a parson to conduct the wedding ceremonies and are snowed in until spring. Milly is furious with Adam and the brothers and exiles them to the barn while the women stay in the house. Humiliated and angered by Milly's rebuke, Adam leaves for the Pontipees' trapping cabin to spend the winter alone. Over the winter, the women vent their anger by pranking the brothers, but their feelings gradually soften towards them. Meanwhile, Milly reveals she is expecting a baby. By springtime, the women and the Pontipees have happily paired off. When Milly has a baby girl, Gideon goes to inform Adam, who refuses to return. Gideon chastises Adam over his selfishness and behavior towards Milly. Adam returns after the snow melts and meets his daughter. He and Milly reconcile. Adam admits that being a father, he now understands how families feel about their daughters and tells his brothers they must return the women. The heartbroken brothers agree to take them home. However, the women hide and refuse to go back. As the brothers search, the women's angry families reach the Pontipees' homestead. As the townsmen sneak up to the farm, Alice's father, Reverend Elcott, hears a baby crying. Fearing the worst, he asks the women whose baby it is. They immediately conspire together and simultaneously answer "mine!" The fathers begrudgingly allow their daughters to marry the brothers in a collective shotgun wedding.

On Monday, May 12, 1970, during the Cold War, unpopular U.S. President Jordan Lyman has signed a nuclear disarmament treaty with the Soviet Union. This produces a wave of dissatisfaction among the opposition and the military, who believe the Soviets cannot be trusted. As the president's ratings plummet, violent protests erupt right outside the White House. The presidential physician warns him of a dangerous cardiac condition which he blithely disregards, too busy to take a prescribed two-week vacation. Meanwhile, Colonel Martin "Jiggs" Casey, the Director of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, learns that his superior, the highly decorated Air Force general James Mattoon Scott, is planning a coup d'etat with the Joint Chiefs. Disguised as a training exercise, the plan involves a secret army unit known as ECOMCON training at a secret Texas base, which will take control of the country's telephone, radio, and television networks and seize the president while he participates in a staged "alert". Scott, advancing his charismatic public persona through nationally televised anti-treaty rallies, will replace the president as head of a military junta. Although personally opposed to Lyman's policies, Casey is appalled by the plot and alerts Lyman. A skeptical Lyman gathers a circle of trusted advisors to investigate. Casey deduces the heads of all military branches but the Navy support Scott's coup, and Vice Admiral Barnswell, aboard an aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean, is apparently the only invited officer to decline. Lyman rescinds his commitment to participate in Scott's alert, pretending he will be away for a fishing weekend, then dispatches his Chief of Staff Paul Girard to Gibraltar to obtain Barnswell's confession. The alcoholic Senator Raymond Clark, Lyman's close friend of 21 years, goes to Texas to locate the secret base, and tasks Casey to gather dirt on the general's private life. The Secret Service surreptitiously films evidence of an attempt to kidnap the president during the phony fishing trip, removing all doubts about the existence of a plot. Girard successfully secures Barnswell's written confession, which is lost when he's killed in a plane crash in Spain. Clark is taken captive when he reaches the secret base and held incommunicado. Exploiting their longtime friendship, Clark convinces the base's deputy commander Colonel Henderson of the actual intent of the impending "alert". Henderson frees Clark and leads an escape back to Washington but is abducted and confined in a military stockade. In a radiophone conference call with the president, Barnswell denies knowledge of any conspiracy. Knowing he can't prove Scott's guilt, Lyman calls him to the White House to demand the conspirators resign. Scott refuses, denying the existence of a plot. Lyman argues that a coup would prompt the Soviets to launch a preemptive nuclear strike and Scott maintains the American people are behind him. Lyman challenges him to resign and run for office in order to seek power legitimately, but Scott is unmoved. Lyman restrains himself from confronting Scott with damning letters that Casey had obtained from Scott's former mistress Eleanor Holbrook. Casey, who has his own romantic interest in Holbrook, eventually returns them to her. Scott meets the other three Joint Chiefs, reasserts his intention to execute the coup, and plans a nighttime network broadcast, but Lyman plans an afternoon press conference to announce the firing of the four men. As the presser begins, Barnswell's confession, recovered from the plane crash, is handed to him and he pauses the proceeding to give time for copies of the confession to be delivered to Scott and the plotters. Scott, devastated, abandons the plan and returns home as Lyman announces the resignation of the other three conspirators on live air. Lyman delivers a speech on the state of the nation and its values, declaring that the nation gains strength through peace rather than by conflict. The press corps applauds.

The ship's medical officer, Dr. Schumann, takes a special interest in La Condesa, a Spanish countess with an opiate addiction, being deported from Cuba to a Spanish prison in Tenerife for illegally aiding the rebel cause in the Cuban Revolution of 1933. The 600 field workers in steerage, being deported to Spain due to the low market price of Cuban sugar, cheer the Condesa as she boards the ship under police escort. She tells the doctor she was motivated by seeing the impoverished conditions in which 5,000 laborers lived, under patronage of the man with whom she lived in luxury. She manipulates the doctor for drugs, but her activism aligns with the doctor's humanitarian ideals that the laborers in steerage be treated like human beings rather than cargo. Their shared sympathies soon evolve into love, though both realize it is a hopeless situation. The doctor conceals his heart condition from her. Selected passengers, mostly Aryan Germans, are invited to dine each night at the captain's table. Some are amused and others offended by the anti-Jewish rants of a German businessman, Rieber, who begins an affair with Lizzi, a blonde woman who admires him for his vitality and mind, until she learns he is married. Austrian-born Rieber extols the virtues of German nationalism and eugenics. The captain is reassured by Rieber's rants, believing that nobody can ever take the Nazi Party seriously. Though Jews and a dwarf are excluded from the table, the Hutten's dog, Baby, is allowed. When Baby is thrown overboard by children from steerage, the dog is saved, but an animal-loving laborer drowns in the rescue, despite the doctor's ministrations. The Huttens fuss over the dog, oblivious that its rescuer has died, even when informed by the doctor. The Jewish Lowenthal is seated at a side table with a dwarf named Glocken, and the two bond over their social exclusion. Later Freytag, a German passenger, is moved to this table when Rieber learns Freytag's wife is Jewish. Eventually Freytag discloses that he is separated from his Jewish wife due to pressure from his family and his employer as result of Nazi Rassenschande rhetoric. Revealing his Iron Cross 2nd class he earned in World War I, Lowenthal discusses with Glocken what it means to be German, including the Nazi Party and its anti-Jewish sentiment, which Lowenthal hopes to be temporary saying Jews have been good for Germany. Lowenthal is ultimately positive about the future of Jews in Germany, while Glocken is diametrically opposed in his pessimism. Glocken tells Lowenthal that he may be the biggest fool on the ship. An American artist couple, David and Jenny, have a passionate but tumultuous relationship. David is disconsolate at his lack of success as a socially committed artist; the independent Jenny dislikes his "unsellable" art and does not wish to compete with it in the relationship. He is dismissive of her artistic talent, which she herself undervalues. David expresses that whoever shares his life will need to accept that his art will always supersede her. Jenny fears that their life together will be endlessly fighting, with neither willing to put the other's needs before their own. Passengers are entertained nightly by a troupe of flamenco musicians and dancers, whose leader pimps the women in the troupe. Johann, an unpaid caregiver to Herr Graf, his invalid uncle, ignores the wholesome and insecure Elsa, who is traveling with her parents. Instead, Johann is attracted to one of the dancers, who rejects him for inability to pay. Johann threatens his stingy uncle if he does not give him money which has been promised to him in his uncle's will. He loses his virginity to one of the dancers, who treats him with gentleness when he pays. Mary Treadwell, a divorced fading beauty hoping to recapture her youth in Paris, is too mature to interest the captain. She disdains the lieutenant who shows interest, dismissing him first as doing his duty to unattended women and later as insignificant. When former baseball player and fellow American Bill Tenny is seated at her table, she finds him crass and ignorant. Tenny expresses surprise at the open hostility toward the Jews on board; she sarcastically replies that maybe he was too busy "lynching Negroes" to focus on Jews. Tenny pesters one of the flamenco dancers, believing that buying a magnum of champagne entitles him to have sex with her. She gives him the cabin number of Mrs. Treadwell. In a drunken stupor, Tenny barges into the cabin and accosts Mrs. Treadwell, who momentarily responds passionately until she realizes that he has mistaken her for a prostitute; she then hits him repeatedly and expels him from the cabin. The ship arrives in Tenerife, where the deported workers from steerage disembark. The doctor briefly considers staying with the Condesa, but the captain calls him foolish, contending that she manipulated him for drugs. After an emotionally painful farewell with the doctor, the Condesa is forced to exit the ship under Civil Guard escort. When the captain tells the distraught doctor she is not worth his anguish, the doctor explodes in a fit of pique, throwing cognac in his face and rebuking him, expressing that the Condesa took action against injustice, while they just carry out the orders they are given. Apologetic, the captain advises the doctor that he looks ill and should not respond to a call from a passenger for medical attention. The doctor ignores this and dies of a heart attack. Upon arrival in Bremerhaven his body is unloaded in a coffin with his estranged wife and sons in attendance. At disembarkation the passengers are shown descending in turn, going back to their ordinary lives. The last passenger to leave the ship is Glocken, who breaks the fourth wall and says he can hear the audience saying, " What has all this to do with us?...Nothing ", he chuckles and walks off.

Arthur Hamilton is a middle-aged banking executive in Scarsdale, New York, who, despite his professional success, remains profoundly unfulfilled. His love for his wife, Emily, has dwindled, and he seldom sees his only daughter, who has relocated to the West Coast and started a family. One day, Arthur receives an address placed into his hand by an unknown person who, somehow, knew his name. Later that day he receives a call from his childhood friend, Charlie, whom he believed to be dead. Though Arthur is initially disbelieving, Charlie claims it was he who approached him with the address and then recounts personal anecdotes that only he could know. Charlie informs him that he must go to the address provided; that it is imperative for him to do so because his life is empty of all motivation and choice. After some contemplation, Arthur decides to take up Charlie's proposition, and travels to the address, which he finds to be an apparent meat-packing plant; there, he is given workman's clothing and headgear, then exits the facility by a different door and is seated inside a truck that takes him to another building. There he meets a woman who directs him to an office and provides him with tea. He finds that he has been drugged and tries to leave the complex. He wanders around and disappears into a large area filled with dark, empty hallways and finds himself in a vulnerable woman's bedroom and while trying to become intimate with her, in his intoxication, he seemingly sexually assaults her. After waking, Arthur is informed that the Company's service comes at a cost of $30,000 and is shown a film of the prior staged assault, ostensibly to make his decision easier. Although he recoils at the apparent use of blackmail, Arthur reluctantly accepts on his own terms, after considering the emptiness in his life. The associates inform Arthur that they will fake his death in a hotel fire using an anonymous cadaver, and Arthur proceeds to undergo multiple extensive procedures by Dr. Innes that transform not only his facial features, but his vocal cords, teeth, and even fingerprints. Once healed, he is given the identity of the younger "Antiochus 'Tony' Wilson", an established visual artist. Arthur later discovers this identity has been taken from someone who recently died. Arthur is relocated by the Company into a community in Malibu, California, filled with people like him who are also "reborns". He attempts to assimilate into his new life, in which he is able to live as an artist —a career he had always aspired to— though he soon finds himself growing restless. While visiting the beach one day, Arthur encounters the freewheeling Nora Marcus. The two develop a swift attraction to each other, and Nora recounts how she came to leave her former life behind. One night, Arthur accompanies Nora to a Bacchanalia party in Santa Barbara. There, the revelers dance, sing, and stomp grapes in a large trough and, after some initial discomfort, Arthur lowers his inhibitions and begins to enjoy himself. Later, Arthur and Nora host a cocktail party for neighbors and other guests. Arthur gets drunk over the course of the night, and begins to speak openly to the other guests about his former identity, which is forbidden by the Company. Consequently, Arthur receives a phone call from Charlie, who warns him that he has put himself in danger by violating the Company's rules. Charlie also reveals that Nora is an employee of the Company who covertly oversees new "reborns" to assure they have a smooth transition. Disenchanted by his new contrived life, Arthur defiantly leaves California, and returns to New York. He arranges a meeting with Emily at his former home, claiming —as Tony— that he was once a friend of Arthur's. The two have a conversation in which Emily shares that she felt Arthur was emotionally disconnected from his life, and was in a constant state of longing that she could not understand. After the meeting, a melancholic Arthur is met by associates of the Company, and he requests that they give him a different identity. They agree to do so, but only if he can provide them with another referral to the Company. He tells them he does not know anyone he could proposition, and demands they carry out the transformation anyway. Returning to the headquarters, Arthur is placed in a waiting room with various other men, including his friend Charlie, all of whom have asked to undergo yet another 'rebirth'. An elated Charlie is chosen and is escorted from the waiting room. Frustrated at the unknown amount of time the men have been waiting to be chosen, and being unable to think of anyone that he can refer to the Company, Arthur angrily demands that his procedure is performed without further delay. Later, as Arthur is wheeled into the operating room, he is met by a chaplain who begins to read him his last rites. After being bound, gagged, and sedated, Arthur comes to realize he is about to be killed. Dr. Innes, who performed Arthur's original transformation, coldly laments to Arthur that he is sorry it has to end this way, and that Arthur's transformation into Tony was his "best work". He explains that Arthur's body will be used as the catalyst for another patient's transformation — the staged scene for that patient's faked death will be a car accident. Dr. Innes proceeds to drill into Arthur's skull to inflict a brain hemorrhage consistent with head injuries sustained in a car crash. As Arthur loses consciousness, he stares into the surgical light, and has a memory of seeing a man playing with his infant daughter on the beach; the image distorts and loses resolution as Arthur dies.

In the distant future, an overcrowded and troubled Earth relies on research conducted by scientists in remote stations across the Solar System. Contact is maintained by spaceships shuttling between the stations and large orbiting space stations. Captain James is preparing to depart from one of these stations around Saturn when he is murdered by Captain Benson. Benson, who was rated "potentially unstable" on a mental exam, then departs from the station using his cargo ship for a small, remote experimental hydroponics research station called Saturn 3. Arriving there, he finds the station run solely by Adam and his younger colleague and lover, Alex. Adam, Alex, and their dog, Sally, enjoy their isolation away from Earth. Alex has spent her entire life in space and knows Earth only from what Adam has told her. It falls to Benson to more fully educate Alex as to the habits and mores of humans who live on Earth, which include drug use. Alex and Adam's idyll is broken when Benson reveals his mission is to replace at least one of the moon's scientists with a robot. The robot—named Hector—is among the first of its kind, a "Demigod Series" model that relies on "pure brain tissue" extracted from human fetuses and is programmed via a direct link to Benson's brain. Adam tells Alex that he is the likely candidate for removal, being that he is close to "abort time" and will have to leave anyway. With Hector assembled, Benson begins preparing the robot, using the neural link implanted in his spine. Thus connected to Benson, Hector quickly learns of Benson's failure of the psychological stability test, and also of his murder of James. With little barrier between the robot's brain and Benson's, Hector is soon imbued with Benson's homicidal nature and his lust for Alex. The robot rebels. Adam and Benson disable the robot while it is recharging and remove its brain. Believing the danger is over, Adam accuses Benson of gross incompetence and orders him to dismantle the robot and return to Earth when the eclipse ends (the eclipse also prevents communication with other stations). Unknown to Benson, Adam, and Alex, Hector remains functional enough to take control of the base's older robots and use them to reassemble his body and reconnect his brain. Unaware of Hector's resurgence, Benson attempts to leave the station while dragging Alex with him. Resuscitated, Hector murders Benson before he can leave with Alex. Hector destroys Benson's spacecraft before the scientists can escape in it, trapping them all on Saturn 3, and assumes control of the station's computer. Trapped in the control room, both Alex and Adam are surprised to see Benson's face on their monitor. The two are directed by a voice they recognise as Benson's to leave the control room, both surprised that Benson is even alive. To their shock, the two are confronted by Hector, now wearing Benson's severed head. A short time later, Alex and Adam wake in their own rooms. To her horror, Alex finds that Hector has installed a brain link at the top of Adam's spine, much like the one that Benson had, and one which will give Hector direct access to Adam's brain. Hector explains that he can 'read' but taking control of Adam 'comes later'. This causes Adam to rebel, and he destroys Hector by tackling him into a waste pit and sacrificing himself with a grenade. In the final scene, Alex is shown aboard a passenger ship returning to Earth. She declines an offer of narcotics from a stewardess and instead looks out of a window for her first glimpse of Earth.

Oscar "Manny" Manheim is a bank robber and hero to the convicts of Alaska's Stonehaven Maximum Security Prison. After two previous escape attempts, Manny is put in solitary confinement for three years. A court order compels the cruel Warden Ranken to release him from solitary. Planning a third breakout, Manny is forced to move his plan to midwinter after he is stabbed in the hand. Manny recruits young prisoner Buck McGeehy to help in the plan. The two men escape through a sewer tunnel and hike to a switchyard. They steal railroad clothing and board a train consisting only of four locomotives. The elderly railroad engineer, Al, has a heart attack after starting the train. He attempts to stop it by pulling the conductor's valve before falling dead from the locomotive, but his application of the brakes disables the dead man's switch without cutting the throttle, so the locomotives burn through the brake shoes and keep going. As the unmanned train accelerates, dispatchers Dave Prince and Frank Barstow are alerted to the situation. Barstow allows the train to reach the mainline while trying to keep the tracks farther down the line clear. The runaway smashes the rear flatbed and caboose of a freight train referred to as Eastbound #12 pulling onto a siding. The collision damages the cab of the lead locomotive and jams the front door of the second engine, an older EMD F-unit. Barstow's superior Eddie McDonald orders him to derail the train. The train's horn then blows, alerting the authorities (and the two fugitives) that someone else is aboard the train. Barstow has the maintainer cancel the derailment. Ranken concludes his two escaped convicts are fleeing by rail. Meanwhile, the fugitives are discovered by Sara, a locomotive hostler who explains that she sounded the horn and the train is out of control. The train is going too fast for them to jump and can only be stopped from the lead engine, but the streamlined body of the second engine means that its now-unusable front door is the only way to reach the lead engine. They manage to slow the train by disconnecting the multi-unit cables between the second and third engine, shutting down the rear two locomotives. The dispatchers realize that the main line will take the train through a tight curve near a chemical plant, where its excessive speed would cause a disastrous derailment. Reluctantly, they divert the runaway onto a dead-end branch line, where its derailment would kill only the three on board. Manny tries forcing Buck into a suicidal scramble around the second engine's frozen nose. Sara's intervention on Buck's behalf results in an armed face-off between the convicts. Emotionally broken, all three slump into depression. Ranken arrives in a helicopter and his accomplice is lowered towards the lead engine, but he falls through the second engine's windscreen and then under the train. Spurred on by the appearance of his archenemy, Manny makes a perilous leap to the lead engine. He falls off the train but grabs onto the coupler, which crushes his injured hand before he manages to climb back up. Ranken boards the locomotive from the helicopter and confronts Manny, but Manny beats him and handcuffs him inside the engine. The frightened warden demands that Manny stop the train, but Manny has chosen to join Ranken in death rather than return to prison. When reminded of Buck and Sara in the second engine, Manny uncouples the lead engine from the rest of the train, leaving the other three engines to coast to a stop. He waves goodbye as Buck begs him to reconsider, then climbs onto the roof in the freezing snow, stretching his arms wide to embrace his freedom and incoming death. Buck and Manny's fellow inmates mourn in their cells as the lone engine vanishes into the storm. The film ends with a quote from Shakespeare 's Richard III: "No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity. But I know none, and therefore am no beast."

Ann Bishop Mullany lives in Baton Rouge, unhappily but comfortably married to John, a successful lawyer. She is in therapy, where she reveals that she is repulsed by the idea of him touching her. Graham Dalton, an old close college friend of John and now a drifter with some money saved up, visits Baton Rouge to see John and perhaps stay in the city. When he arrives at their home, he meets Ann, who learns that John has invited Graham to stay with them until he finds an apartment. When John arrives home, Graham's demeanor becomes remarkably more guarded; though he realizes he now has nothing in common with John, he and Ann get along well. John is having an affair with Ann's sister Cynthia, a free-spirited artist and bartender, which he rationalizes by blaming Ann's frigidity. Ann helps Graham look for an apartment. Once he has a place, she makes an impromptu visit and notices stacks of camcorder videotapes, labeled with women's names. When asked, Graham explains that they contain interviews with women about their deepest sexual desires and fantasies. Uncomfortable, Ann abruptly leaves. The next day, Cynthia appears uninvited at Graham's apartment and presses Graham to explain what "spooked" Ann. He reluctantly explains it was the videotapes that disturbed her and that he achieves gratification by watching the videos in private. Graham propositions Cynthia to make an interview tape, assuring her that only he will see it. She agrees, and later tells Ann about the experience. She is horrified, as is John, when Cynthia later tells him. Cleaning her home the next day, Ann discovers Cynthia's pearl earring in her bedroom while vacuuming and deduces her affair with John. Furious, Ann goes to Graham's apartment with the intention of making a videotape. He objects, but she is insistent. Later, Ann demands a divorce from John and reveals that she made a tape with Graham. John immediately becomes enraged so that he seems ready to strike Ann, but instead rushes to Graham's apartment and assaults Graham, punching him in the face, then dragging him outside and locking him out, then watches Ann's tape. In the video, Ann says she has never felt any kind of "satisfaction" from sex. Graham asks if she ever thinks of having sex with other men; she admits she has thought of Graham. Ann turns the camera on Graham, who resists opening up but soon confesses that he is haunted by his ex-girlfriend Elizabeth and that his motivation in returning to Baton Rouge was an attempt to achieve some closure. He explains that he was a pathological liar, which destroyed his relationship with her. Graham has since gone to great lengths to avoid people and relationships. Ann kisses him, then he turns off the camcorder, ending the tape. An unhinged John joins Graham on the front porch and, with intense viciousness, claims to have had sex with Elizabeth while she and Graham were a couple, saying: "She was no saint. She was good in bed, and she could keep a secret. That's all I can say about her." After he leaves, a distraught Graham destroys his camcorder and all of the videotapes. Some time later, John is urgently summoned to his boss's office. Ann and Cynthia reconcile at the bar Cynthia tends. Later, Ann goes to Graham's and joins him on the front porch. She predicts rain, to which he replies: "It is raining."

In 1194, English nobleman Robin of Locksley has spent years in an Ayyubid prison in Jerusalem, having followed King Richard the Lionheart on the Third Crusade. Robin and his comrade Peter Dubois escape, saving the life of a Moor named Azeem Al Bakir. Mortally wounded, Peter makes Robin swear to protect his sister Marian, and Azeem vows to accompany Robin until his life debt is repaid. In King Richard's absence, George, the cruel Sheriff of Nottingham, plots to seize the throne for himself, and has Robin's father killed for remaining loyal to King Richard. Arriving home four months later, Robin saves a young boy named Wulf from the Sheriff's ruthless cousin, Guy of Gisbourne. He finds his father Lord Locksley's corpse and his family's servant Duncan blinded by Gisbourne; Duncan explains that Lord Locksley was falsely accused of devil worship. The Sheriff consults the witch Mortianna, who foresees King Richard's return and that Robin and Azeem "will be our deaths". Robin tells Marian of Peter's death, but she sees little need for his protection. Fleeing the Sheriff's forces into Sherwood Forest, Robin, Duncan and Azeem encounter a group of outlaws led by Wulf's father Little John, who challenges Robin to a duel. Robin wins and earns John's friendship but the bandit Will Scarlet refuses to trust him. Confronting the corrupt Bishop of Hereford for his role in Lord Locksley's death, Robin humiliates the Sheriff, who sends Gisbourne to terrorize the peasants in the search for "Robin of the Hood". Despite the price on his head, Robin shapes the growing band of outlaws into a formidable force against the Sheriff. They rob rich folk passing through the forest and distribute the stolen wealth and food among the poor, and coerce the beer-loving Friar Tuck to join them. Marian offers Robin any aid she can and they fall in love. Robin's success and public support infuriate the Sheriff, who worsens his abuse of the peasants and kills Gisbourne for failing to stop the outlaws. Mortianna advises the Sheriff to recruit fearsome Celtic warriors from Scotland and that he must marry someone of royal blood: Marian, King Richard's cousin. Betrayed by the Bishop, Marian is taken prisoner and Duncan rides to warn Robin, unknowingly followed by the Sheriff's men. They storm Sherwood with Celtic reinforcements and burn Robin's hideout, capturing many of the outlaws and killing Duncan. With Robin presumed dead, the Sheriff threatens the prisoners and their families, forcing Marian to agree to marriage. Will bargains with the Sheriff to betray Robin and returns to Sherwood, but instead reveals that he is Robin's half-brother, and they reconcile. On the day of the wedding, Robin and his men infiltrate Nottingham Castle and save the outlaws from being hanged. With the help of Azeem's explosive powder, they free the prisoners, and Azeem inspires the peasants to revolt, forcing the Sheriff to retreat with Marian into his keep. The Bishop hastily performs the marriage but before the Sheriff can consummate it, Robin bursts in. Friar Tuck finds the Bishop fleeing with gold, burdens him with additional treasure and defenestrates him. In a fierce duel, Robin kills the Sheriff, and Azeem kills Mortianna in defense of Robin, thus fulfilling his life-debt. Later, Robin and Marian's wedding in Sherwood is interrupted by the return of King Richard, who blesses the marriage and thanks Robin for saving his throne.

A gang of violent young neo-Nazi skinheads from Footscray, Victoria, Australia, attack three Vietnamese Australian teenagers in a tunnel at Footscray Station, brutally beating two of them. The gang is led by Hando, a violent, reckless, and unpredictable psychopath with strong white nationalist beliefs and homicidal tendencies, with his friend and second-in-command, the quiet, reserved, but similarly violent Davey. At their local pub, Hando and Davey meet Gabrielle, who suffers from poorly controlled epilepsy, the day after her sexually abusive, affluent father, Martin, has her drug-addicted boyfriend arrested. Gabrielle begins a romantic relationship with Hando, which, despite a strong start, quickly becomes dysfunctional as he becomes increasingly abusive towards her. After the gang vandalises a shopping mall, friends of the gang visit from Canberra, one of whom has joined the Royal Australian Navy. A party at the warehouse follows. The next day, two boys go to the pub, which has just been sold to a Vietnamese businessman by the owner. Upon seeing the new owner and his sons, they inform Hando, who arrives with his gang, and they savagely beat two of the new owner's sons, while the third son escapes and calls for help. Fed up with the gang's antagonism and violence, a large mob of armed and angry Vietnamese men, led by Tiger, arrives and descends upon the skinheads. The Vietnamese outnumber the skinheads by droves, and in the ensuing brawl and chase, several skinheads are beaten by the angry mob, among them Magoo, Luke, Champ, and Brett. The rest of the gang are chased back to their rented warehouse, from which they narrowly escape as the Vietnamese mob breaks in and ransacks the building before burning it down. The skinheads soon find a new base at a nearby warehouse, after evicting a pair of squatters, and plan retaliation against the Vietnamese. When the gang agrees to acquire firearms, two female friends of the gang depart in disgust. Gabrielle suggests the gang burgle her father's mansion for the guns. After beating and tying up Martin, the gang ransacks the house, smashes one of his cars, and raids his wine collection. The youngest skinhead, Bubs, steals a deactivated revolver from the house during the burglary. Gabrielle tells Martin the burglary is revenge for his years of abuse, then reveals to Davey her plan to take Hando away from his violent life. Martin eventually frees himself and uses a handgun to scare away the gang, who flee in the trashed vehicle and leave behind most of the stolen goods. Due to this incident, Davey begins to question his violent lifestyle. Agitated by Gabrielle's criticism of the poor outcome of the robbery and their living conditions, Hando abruptly hits, berates, dumps, and then evicts her. Davey, unable to tolerate the excess violence and Hando's cruel and unpredictable nature any further, declares his departure from the gang and gives Gabrielle his German grandmother's address, where he will be staying. Gabrielle informs the police of the gang's location and spends the night with Davey, where they confess their feelings for each other. Davey also reveals his doubts about his violent lifestyle to Gabrielle, having removed the racist patches from his flight jacket out of concern for his grandmother. The morning after, the police raid the warehouse where the skinhead gang is hiding. Bubs is shot in the head after pointing the stolen deactivated gun at the police, and what remains of the gang is beaten and arrested. Hando, who was returning to the warehouse and fled when he spotted the police, successfully evades capture as the last remaining member of his gang. Arriving at Davey's granny flat, Hando finds his friend in bed with Gabrielle. Hando accuses her of informing the police, but Davey says they were together the whole time since leaving the squat. However, Hando convinces Davey and Gabrielle to come with him by claiming the police will soon raid the residence, and the trio goes on the run. They rob a service station, where Hando strangles the Asian attendant to death; and, after driving all night, they stop at Point Addis, Bells Beach, the next morning. There, Gabrielle overhears a conversation wherein Hando tries to convince Davey to abandon her. Feeling betrayed, Gabrielle sets their car on fire and admits to tipping the police off about the gang's whereabouts. A bus of Japanese tourists arrive and the passengers taking pictures and video, while the tour guide and the driver stop the fire. Hando, infuriated beyond sense, attacks Gabrielle and attempts to asphyxiate her, first by strangling her and then by drowning her in the surf. Davey attempts to fight Hando several times and successfully disrupts each attempt on Gabrielle's life, but he is quickly fought off and beaten down each time. Eventually, Hando attempts to smother Gabrielle in the sand, before Davey, desperate to save Gabrielle, stabs Hando in the neck with his Hitler Youth knife. Hando staggers away before finally collapsing. As the Japanese tourists look on, a weeping Davey attempts to comfort a petrified Gabrielle as Hando's corpse gazes lifelessly out at the ocean.

Charlie Simms is a scholarship student at Baird, an exclusive New England preparatory school. Karen Rossi hires him to watch her uncle, retired Army Lieutenant Colonel Frank Slade, during Thanksgiving weekend. Charlie accepts so he can buy a plane ticket home to Gresham, Oregon for Christmas. He meets Frank, a highly decorated, blind Vietnam War veteran who has become a cantankerous and cynical alcoholic. Charlie and student George Willis Jr. witness three classmates set up a prank to humiliate the headmaster, Mr. Trask, by dousing his prized automobile, a Jaguar XJ, with flour and water. Afterward, Trask learns of the witnesses and unsuccessfully presses them to name the perpetrators. He privately offers Charlie virtually guaranteed acceptance to Harvard University if he informs on the other students. Trask schedules a meeting of the school disciplinary committee to take place on the Monday after the Thanksgiving weekend. Frank Slade unexpectedly takes Charlie on a trip to New York City and arranges their stay at the Waldorf-Astoria hotel. During dinner in the Oak Room at the Plaza Hotel, Frank reveals that the goals of his trip are to stay at a luxurious hotel, enjoy good food and wine, visit his older brother, and have sex with a "terrific" woman. Afterward, he intends to die by suicide. On Thanksgiving Day, they visit Frank's brother at his home in White Plains. Frank provokes everyone at dinner, which ends in a confrontation with his nephew Randy, who reveals that Frank was not blinded heroically in combat, but in an accident that occurred when he drunkenly juggled live grenades to show off for a group of younger officers. Frank assaults Randy for repeatedly calling Charlie "Chucky", a name Charlie despises, revealing Frank's growing affection for Charlie. As they return to the city, Charlie mentions his problem at school. Frank advises he turn informant, warning that George will probably submit to Trask's pressure, so he should act first so he can attend Harvard. While at The Pierre 's Cotillion Ballroom, Frank identifies the scent (Ogleby Sisters soap) of a young woman waiting for her date. He introduces himself and offers to teach her the tango. The evening ends with Frank having sex with a high-class escort, completing the stated objectives of his trip. Despondent the next morning, Frank is uninterested in any suggestions for the day until Charlie brings up going for a car ride. Frank talks a Ferrari salesman into letting them take a convertible for a test ride. When on the road, Frank becomes depressed again until Charlie allows him to drive. When they are pulled over by a policeman, Frank convinces the officer to let them go without revealing that he is blind. After returning the car, Frank again becomes despondent. He jaywalks into rushing traffic on Park Avenue and narrowly escapes being struck by multiple cars. When they return to the hotel, Frank sends Charlie to buy cigars. Charlie leaves but becomes suspicious and returns to find Frank donning his dress uniform and preparing to end his life with his service pistol. They scuffle briefly and Frank breaks down. He backs down after Charlie convinces him that he has much to live for and should courageously face his circumstances. On Monday morning, Charlie and George appear before the Baird disciplinary committee with the whole student body in attendance. Frank unexpectedly arrives and sits with Charlie. George Jr. provides tentative identifications but claims he was not wearing his contact lenses, so he cannot be positive. Charlie refuses to confirm George Jr.'s identification, so Trask recommends his expulsion. Frank gives a speech defending Charlie, denounces Baird for not living up to its own standards, and urges the committee to value Charlie's integrity. The disciplinary committee places the instigators on probation, denies George credit for naming them, and excuses Charlie from the proceedings. As Charlie escorts Frank to his limousine, political science professor Christine Downes, a member of the disciplinary committee, commends Frank for his speech. They flirt and he impresses her by recognizing her perfume. Charlie accompanies Frank home, where Frank happily greets his niece's children.

In Verona Beach, the Capulets and Montagues are two rival business empires. The animosity of the older generation—Fulgencio and Gloria Capulet and Ted and Caroline Montague—is felt by their younger relatives. A shootout occurs between Montague Benvolio, Romeo 's cousin, and Capulet Tybalt, Juliet 's cousin, creating chaos in the city. The Chief of Police, Captain Prince, arrests Benvolio and Tybalt before reprimanding the families, warning them that if such an event occurs again, their lives "shall pay the forfeit of the peace". Benvolio and Romeo learn of a Capulet party that evening, which they decide to gate-crash. Romeo agrees on hearing that Rosaline, with whom he is madly in love, is attending. They meet their friend, Mercutio, who has tickets to the party, and Romeo takes ecstasy as they proceed to the Capulet mansion. The effects of the drug and the party overwhelm Romeo, who goes to the restroom. There he sees and meets Juliet, and the two instantly fall in love, both unaware of who the other is. Tybalt spots Romeo and vows to kill him for trespassing into his family's home. After Romeo leaves the party, he and Juliet each learn that they belong to the feuding families, but he returns to propose to her. She tells him that if he sends word by the following day, they will be betrothed. The next day, Romeo asks Father Laurence to marry them, and he agrees. Romeo passes the word on via Juliet's nurse, and they soon get married. Tybalt encounters the Montagues and Mercutio at the beach. Romeo then comes and attempts to make peace, but Tybalt assaults him. Mercutio intervenes and batters Tybalt, and is about to kill him when Romeo stops him. Tybalt takes the opportunity to fatally wound Mercutio, who curses both houses before dying. Enraged, Romeo chases after the fleeing Tybalt and shoots him dead, avenging Mercutio's death. Captain Prince banishes Romeo from the city, so he goes into hiding with Father Laurence. The nurse arrives and tells him that Juliet is waiting for him. Romeo climbs Juliet's balcony and they consummate their marriage, with him departing the next morning. Meanwhile, Fulgencio decides Juliet will marry Dave Paris, the governor's son. The next morning, Gloria informs Juliet that she is to marry Paris at St. Peter's Church. When Juliet refuses, Fulgencio physically assaults her and threatens to disown her if she doesn't accept it. She runs away and seeks out Father Laurence, imploring him to help her, while threatening to commit suicide. He gives her a potion that will let her fake her own death, after which she will be placed within the Capulet vault to awaken 24 hours later. Father Laurence vows to inform Romeo of the plot via overnight letter, whereupon the latter will sneak into the vault. Once reunited with Juliet, the two will escape to Mantua, the remote trailer park in the desert where Romeo has been hiding out. However, Romeo does not see the delivered letter so, believing Juliet to be dead, buys a vial of poison from an apothecary. Romeo enters the church where Juliet lies and consumes the poison just as Juliet wakes up. Distraught over his death, she shoots herself in the head with his gun, falling down beside his lifeless body. As the bodies of both Romeo and Juliet are being loaded onto ambulances, the parents of both houses arrive at the scene. Captain Prince approaches their fathers, berating them both for the deaths of their children that their foolish feud has caused.

Although the film does not have a linear plot, a structure exists, telling the same story from three different perspectives. At the beginning, Soderbergh speaks to the audience in a style meant to evoke Cecil B. DeMille's introduction to The Ten Commandments. Fletcher Munson is an office employee working under Theodore Azimuth Schwitters, the leader of a self-help company known as Eventualism. The first part of the film is seen from Fletcher's perspective, seeing the underlying meaning in everything. He pays more attention to meaning, rather than what is said. He shows less and less attention to other people, to the point where he comes home and communicates with his wife by describing what they are saying. When Fletcher's co-worker Lester Richards dies, Fletcher takes his job as speechwriter. His personal life suffers because of this. He becomes more detached from his wife, who copes by having an affair. Meanwhile, Elmo Oxygen, an exterminator, goes from house to house, bedding the housewives who work for Schwitters. In each house he takes pictures of his genitals using cameras he finds. Elmo and the women speak in a nonsensical code. Fletcher's key will not work in his car door. He looks around to find that his actual car (parked two spots away) is an exact match for the one he is trying to get into. He goes to enter his car when he sees a man who is his exact double get into the car he just tried to enter. Fletcher follows his doppelgänger home, closes his eyes, and becomes him. Next we follow Fletcher's doppelgänger, Dr. Jeffrey Korchek, a dentist. He always wears a jogging suit. He is also a fan of Muzak, and is the mystery man that Fletcher's wife has been sleeping with. Korchek suggests she leave Fletcher for him. The next day, Korchek has breakfast with his heroin -addicted brother, who asks to stay with Korchek and for money. Korchek says that his brother should not be dealing with drug dealers and that he can get him drugs. Korchek goes to work, where he meets Attractive Woman Number 2, Mrs. Munson's doppelgänger. Korchek falls instantly in love and writes her a letter professing such. He leaves the note and goes home, where he sees a car in the driveway. It is Mrs. Munson, who has left Fletcher. Korchek admits that he has fallen in love with someone else. Mrs. Munson is upset and leaves. The next day Korchek gets to work and is confronted by a man who says "Your brother, eight hours, fifteen thousand dollars." Almost all of his dialog consists of these three commands. Korchek goes into the office and finds a letter from a law firm representing Attractive Woman Number 2, who is filing a sexual harassment suit against him. He discovers that his brother has stolen all of his money. Korchek leaves work. Korchek is shot dead. A couple following Elmo approach him, to convince him to stop playing his role in the film, in order to become a star in an action show. Unlike the rest of the film, Elmo's storyline moves forward in time. Finally we see the perspective of Mrs. Munson. We move through the storyline, seeing her experiences with Fletcher and Dr. Korchek and being a mom. The events are the same but Fletcher and Korchek speak foreign languages, similar to the "generic greetings" from earlier. Once Mrs. Munson leaves Korchek, she reconciles with Fletcher and they go home. Fletcher finishes Schwitters' speech. Schwitters mounts the podium and gives the oration. After Schwitters acknowledges the applause with a "Thank you," Elmo bursts in and shoots him in the shoulder. Schwitters survives and Elmo is arrested and interrogated. In a shopping mall Fletcher narrates events from the rest of his life. Then, Soderbergh returns in front of a blank movie screen and asks if there are any questions. After offering several responses he walks offstage as the camera pulls back to reveal he's been talking to an empty auditorium. A man clad only in a black T-shirt appears at the beginning and conclusion of the film, being chased by men in white coats through a field. In the beginning, the T-shirt sports the title of the film; later, it says "The End." The film has no beginning or end credits, although the fictitious persons and copyright disclaimers flash for a millisecond to conclude the film.