In November 1918, a few days before the Armistice, Edouard Péricourt saves Albert Maillard's life. The two men have nothing in common but the war. Lieutenant Pradelle, by ordering a senseless assault, destroys their lives while binding them as companions in misfortune. On the ruins of the carnage of WWI, condemned to live, the two attempt to survive. Thus, as Pradelle is about to make a fortune with the war victims' corpses, Albert and Edouard mount a monumental scam with the bereaved families' commemoration and with a nation's hero worship.

Ben is a witty and charismatic but narcissistic and easily-enraged serial killer who holds forth at length about whatever comes to mind, be it the "craft" of murder, the failings of architecture, his own poetry, or classical music, which he plays with his girlfriend Valérie. A film crew joins him on his sadistic adventures, recording them for a fly on the wall documentary. Ben takes them to meet his family and friends while boasting of murdering many people at random and dumping their bodies in canals and quarries. The viewer witnesses these grisly killings in graphic detail. Ben ventures into apartment buildings, explaining how it is more cost-effective to attack old people than young couples because the elderly have more cash at home and are easier to kill. In a following scene, he screams wildly at an elderly lady, causing her to have a heart attack. As she lies dying, he casually remarks that this method saved him a bullet. Ben continues his candid explanations and his rampage, shooting, strangling, and beating his victims to death. His murders often involve robbery and theft. His victims include women, the elderly, immigrants, and postmen (his favorite targets). He enjoys killing a postman at the start of each month because they tend to have parcels with money and other goods he can steal. He also enjoys killing women because he claims they do not fight back as much. However, Ben also kills a real estate developer who rudely evicted one of his friends, and when he kills an immigrant night watchman at a construction site, he expresses concern that the construction company hired the African employee for unscrupulous reasons (before launching into his own racist tirade and requesting the film crew expose the body’s genitals). At the same construction site, Ben points out where he killed and buried two Muslims, and explains that he made sure to entomb their bodies in a wall that faces Mecca. During filming, some of Ben's crew are killed; their deaths are later called "occupational hazards" by a crew member and off-handedly mourned. The camera crew becomes more and more involved in the murders, starting out as silent accomplices but gradually assisting Ben in his killings. When Ben invades a home and kills an entire family, they help him hold down a young boy and smother him with a pillow, all the while keeping up a casual conversation. At the abandoned building that Ben uses for a hideout, the crew encounters two Italian criminals or gangsters also hiding out in the building. Ben kills the Italians before discovering that they were actually also being filmed by a competing documentary camera crew. Ben and his camera crew have fun taking turns as they shoot the rival crew members to death and record the whole thing. After a night of drinking with the film crew, Ben invades a home and interrupts a couple having sex. He then takes the pair hostage, holding the man at gunpoint while he and the crew gang-rape the woman. The following morning, the camera dispassionately records the aftermath: the woman has been butchered with a knife, her entrails spilling out, while the husband had his throat cut. Later, Ben's girlfriend and family receive death threats from the brother of one of the Italian criminals whom Ben had killed earlier. Ben kills an acquaintance in front of his girlfriend and friends during a birthday dinner as it is suggested he had been close to her while he was in prison. Spattered with blood, they act as though nothing horrible has happened, continuing to offer Ben gifts. The film crew disposes of the body for Ben. After a victim flees before he can be killed, Ben is arrested, but he escapes. At this point, someone, presumably the brother of the dead Italian along with other members of the two dead Italians' criminal organization, starts taking revenge on Ben and his family. Ben discovers that his girlfriend Valérie has been killed: a flutist, she has been murdered in a particularly humiliating manner, with her flute inserted into her anus. He later finds that his parents met the same fate, with his mother, who owns a shop and is "not a musician", being sodomized with the end of a broomstick. This prompts Ben to decide that he must leave. He meets the camera crew to say farewell, but in the middle of reciting a poem, he is abruptly shot dead by an off-camera gunman. The camera crew is then picked off one by one. After the camera falls, it keeps running, and the film ends with the death of the fleeing sound recordist.

In 1958 New York City, shipbuilding magnate Herbert Greenleaf, believing Tom Ripley attended Princeton with his son, Dickie, pays Tom $1,000 to travel to Italy and persuade him to return to the United States. Taking an ocean liner first-class, Tom pretends to be Dickie and befriends American socialite Meredith Logue. In the seaside village of Mongibello, Tom befriends Dickie and his American girlfriend, Marge Sherwood, claiming to be a former Princeton classmate. He enjoys Dickie's extravagant lifestyle and becomes obsessed with Dickie himself, but Dickie's wealthy friend Freddie Miles distrusts Tom and treats him with contempt. Returning from Rome, Dickie becomes increasingly annoyed by Tom. Dickie has impregnated and then spurns Silvana, a local woman who then drowns herself. Tom promises a guilt-ridden Dickie to keep the death a secret. After Herbert cuts off Tom's travel funds, Dickie cancels a trip to Venice and tells Tom that they should part ways. However, Dickie convinces Tom to take a final trip with him to San Remo. Aboard a small boat, Dickie says he is tired of Tom and is going to marry Marge, while Tom tells Dickie he is selfish and hurting everyone. Their argument becomes physical, and while the two get into a fight, Tom ends up killing Dickie by repeatedly striking him with an oar. Tom takes Dickie's belongings and scuttles the boat. Realizing that locals frequently mistake him for Dickie, Tom assumes his identity. He forges a letter to Marge, convincing her that Dickie has left her and moved to Rome. Tom creates the illusion that Dickie is still alive by checking into one hotel as Dickie and another as himself, then fabricating an exchange of communications between the two. Through forgery, he is able to draw on Dickie's allowance on which he can live lavishly. In Rome, Tom runs into Meredith, who still knows him as Dickie, and attends an opera with her family. His ruse is threatened when he unexpectedly runs into Marge and her friend, Peter Smith-Kingsley at the same opera. Tom rushes Meredith out of the opera house and rejects her advances. Later, Freddie shows up at Tom's apartment looking for Dickie. When the landlady addresses Tom as Dickie, Freddie realizes the fraud, so Tom fatally bludgeons him with a bust and disposes of his body. When Freddie's body is found, police visit the apartment to question "Dickie". Tom forges a suicide note for Dickie that claims responsibility for Freddie's death. Under his real name, Tom travels to Venice, where he again encounters Peter. Herbert Greenleaf arrives in Italy, accompanied by private detective Alvin MacCarron. Tom is about to kill Marge after she discovers he has Dickie's ring, but Peter arrives and interrupts them. Marge is certain that Tom is culpable, but Herbert dismisses Marge's suspicions. MacCarron tells Tom the police are convinced that Dickie, who had a history of violence, murdered Freddie before killing himself. MacCarron also tells Tom that Herbert intends to bequeath a large portion of Dickie's trust fund to him, to reward his loyalty to Dickie and ensure his silence. Cleared of his crimes, and with the income to finally live Dickie's lifestyle as himself, Tom boards a liner to Greece with Peter, who is implied to be Tom's lover. During the voyage, Tom runs into Meredith, who is sailing with family members. Tom kisses her and promises to talk later. Tom goes to Peter's cabin. Peter says he saw Tom kissing Meredith and demands answers. After apologizing for lying, a sobbing Tom strangles Peter and returns to his cabin, alone.

On a Friday night in Chicago, mobster Johnny Ross briefly meets his brother, Pete, after fleeing the Outfit. The next morning, Lieutenant Frank Bullitt of the San Francisco Police Department (SFPD), along with his team, Delgetti and Stanton, are tasked by federal prosecutor Walter Chalmers with guarding Ross over the weekend, until he can be presented as a witness to a Senate subcommittee hearing on organized crime on Monday morning. The detectives are told he is in a cheap hotel on the Embarcadero. At 1:00 am Sunday, while Stanton is phoning Bullitt to say Chalmers and a friend want to come up, Ross unchains the room door. Two hitmen burst in, shooting Stanton in the leg and Ross in the chest. Chalmers, who has ambitions of public office and needs Ross as his star witness, holds Bullitt responsible. After Ross dies in the hospital, Bullitt sends the body to the morgue as a John Doe to keep the investigation open. An informant states that Ross was in San Francisco because he had stolen millions of dollars from the Outfit. Bullitt also discovers that Ross made a long-distance phone call to a hotel in San Mateo. While driving his Ford Mustang, Bullitt becomes aware he is being followed by a Dodge Charger. He eludes his pursuers, and then turns the tables as he follows the hitmen. An extended chase ensues through the city, ending in an explosion in Brisbane, when the Charger crashes into a gas station, killing the two hitmen. Bullitt and Delgetti are confronted by their superior, Captain Sam Bennett. Chalmers (who is assisted by SFPD Captain Baker) serves them a writ of habeas corpus, forcing Bullitt to reveal that Ross has died. Bennett ignores the writ because it is Sunday; this allows Bullitt to investigate the lead of the long-distance phone call to San Mateo. With his car damaged from the chase, Bullitt gets a ride from his architect girlfriend, Cathy. The two then find a woman garroted in her hotel room. Cathy confronts Bullitt about his work, saying, "You're living in a sewer, Frank." She wonders, "What will happen to us in time?" Bullitt and Delgetti examine the victim's luggage and discover a travel brochure for Rome, as well as traveler's checks made out to an Albert and Dorothy Renick. Bullitt requests their passport applications from Chicago. Bullitt, Bennett, Chalmers, and Baker gather around the telecopier as the applications arrive. Chalmers turns out to have sent Bullitt to guard a Doppelgänger, Albert Renick, a used-car salesman from Chicago, while his wife Dorothy was staying in San Mateo. Bullitt realizes that Ross was playing the politically-ambitious Chalmers by using Renick as a decoy so he could slip out of the country Sunday night. Delgetti and Bullitt watch the Rome gate at San Francisco International Airport, but Bullitt realizes the real Ross (on Renick's passport) probably switched to an earlier London flight, which is ordered to return to the terminal. Bullitt chases a fleeing Ross back to the crowded passenger terminal, where Ross guns down a deputy sheriff before being shot dead by Bullitt. Chalmers arrives to survey the scene, but leaves, saying nothing. Early Monday morning, Bullitt arrives home to find Cathy asleep in his bed, having chosen to stay. He places his gun on a banister to make it easier to wash his face. As he washes, he looks at himself in the mirror. The last moment of the film cuts away from showing his face in the mirror to a closeup of his gun resting on the banister outside the bathroom with the sound of running water from the faucet.

In 2010, Ethiopian Jewish miners retrieve a rare black opal from the Welo mine in Ethiopia. In 2012, gambling addict Howard Ratner runs KMH, a jewelry store in New York City's Diamond District. He struggles to pay off his gambling debts, which include the $100,000 he owes to Arno, his loan shark brother-in-law. His domestic life is split between his wife Dinah, who has agreed to divorce after Passover, and his girlfriend Julia, a KMH employee. Howard's business associate, Demany, brings the basketball star Kevin Garnett to KMH. While he is there, the opal, which Howard had smuggled from Africa, arrives. Garnett becomes obsessed with the opal, insisting on holding onto it for good luck at his game that night. Howard reluctantly agrees, accepting Garnett's 2008 NBA Championship ring as collateral. After Garnett leaves, Howard pawns the ring and wins a six-way parlay on Garnett playing extraordinarily well in that night's game. The next day, Demany says that Garnett still has the opal, angering Howard. Howard is ambushed at his daughter's school play by Arno and his goons, Phil and Nico. Howard's winning bet should have earned him $600,000, but Arno reveals that he placed a stop on the bet because it was made with money Howard owed him. Phil and Nico strip Howard naked and lock him in the trunk of his car, forcing him to call Dinah for help. Howard meets Demany at a nightclub party hosted by the singer the Weeknd to retrieve the opal, but learns that Garnett still has it. Howard discovers Julia snorting cocaine in a bathroom with the Weeknd and gets into a fight with him. Feeling betrayed, Howard confronts Julia and demands that she move out of his apartment. Garnett returns the opal before an auction and offers to purchase it for $175,000, but Howard refuses, believing it is worth much more. Garnett demands his ring back, but Howard lies, saying it is at his house. After Garnett leaves in dismay, Howard berates Demany for allowing Garnett to hold onto the opal for so long. Incensed, Demany quits and trashes Howard's office. After an awkward Passover dinner, Dinah rejects Howard's plea to give their marriage another chance. Just before the auction starts, Howard discovers the opal has been appraised for significantly less than his initial estimate of $1 million. He convinces his father-in-law, Gooey, to bid on the gem to drive up the price, but the plan backfires when Garnett fails to top Gooey's final bid. A furious Gooey gives Howard the opal before Arno, Phil, and Nico assault Howard outside the auction house. Howard returns to KMH, bloody and in tears. Julia comforts him, and they reconcile. Howard learns that Garnett is still willing to purchase the opal. Garnett goes to KMH to pay, giving Howard enough money to repay his debt to Arno. Arno, Phil, and Nico arrive at KMH just before Garnett leaves, but before they enter his office, Howard tells Julia to bet the cash on a three-way parlay on Garnett playing well. Julia escapes as the thugs find Howard in his office and threaten him, while Julia travels by helicopter to the Mohegan Sun casino to place the bet. Arno tells Howard to call Julia and cancel the bet, but he refuses. Furious, the three attempt to pursue her, but Howard locks them between the store's security doors. Howard watches the game on television while Arno, Phil, and Nico remain trapped. Garnett's Boston Celtics win the game, winning Howard $1.2 million. An ecstatic Howard frees Arno, Phil, and Nico, but the enraged Phil shoots Howard dead. Arno protests and tries to escape, but Phil shoots him dead, too. Julia leaves the casino with Howard's winnings as Phil and Nico loot the store.

Lawrence Jamieson is a sophisticated and affluent British con artist operating in the town of Beaumont-sur-Mer on the French Riviera. Aided by his manservant Arthur and amoral police official Andre, Lawrence seduces wealthy women and cons them for high-value sums by posing as an exiled prince raising money for his country's freedom fighters. While returning from a trip to Zurich, Lawrence encounters Freddy Benson, an unsophisticated American hustler who brags of conning women out of relatively meager amounts with stories of his sick grandmother. After Freddy inadvertently interferes with Lawrence's latest target, Lawrence tricks him into leaving town. However, after meeting one of Lawrence's former victims and realizing Lawrence is a fellow con artist, Freddy returns and blackmails Lawrence into training him. Lawrence teaches Freddy his refined style of deception—with limited success—and develops a new con in which Freddy portrays his mentally disabled brother to drive away women once Lawrence has their money. Freddy quits after Lawrence refuses to pay him a portion of the ill-gotten gains. Unwilling to share his territory with Freddy, the pair agree to a bet: the first to con $50,000 from a selected victim wins and the other leaves town. They choose newly-arrived tourist, the naive "United States Soap Queen" Janet Colgate. Lawrence attempts his usual con but Freddy intervenes, posing as a U.S. Navy veteran and psychosomatic parapalegic who needs $50,000 for treatment from psychiatrist Dr. Emil Schaffhausen. In response, Lawrence poses as Schaffhausen and agrees to treat Freddy if Janet pays him $50,000 directly. The pair compete for Janet's attention, with Lawrence tormenting Freddy under the guise of treatment, and Freddy manipulating her with a fake suicide attempt. One night, in a club, Lawrence dances with Janet and taunts Freddy which upsets some nearby British sailors. Freddy convinces them that Lawrence stole Janet from him and the sailors agree to Shanghai Lawrence. Later, Lawrence learns that Janet is not wealthy—having won her holiday and title in a soap company competition—yet has liquidated all of her assets to help Freddy. Touched by her genuine kindness and generosity, and adhering to his personal code of never taking advantage of the poor or virtuous, Lawrence calls off the bet. Freddy counters with a new bet: the first to seduce Janet wins. Lawrence refuses to participate but agrees that if Freddy succeeds, he wins. After Lawrence is abducted by the sailors, Freddy returns to Janet's hotel room and demonstrates his "love" for her by walking. Lawrence, who is also in the room, declares Freddy cured, having appeased the sailors by revealing his status as a Royal Naval Reserve officer. He leaves Freddy with the sailors who haze him until the morning while Lawrence puts Janet on an airplane home. However, Janet returns to her hotel room to find Freddy waiting and declares her love for him. Andre informs Lawrence who prepares to accept his defeat until Janet arrives at Lawrence's villa in tears, revealing that Freddy stole the $50,000 she had collected for him. Lawrence gifts her a bag containing $50,000 of his own money and returns her to the airport, instructing Andre to arrest Freddy. Before her plane departs, Janet returns the bag to Lawrence, saying she cannot accept it. Andre arrives with Freddy who claims that Janet stole his wallet and clothes. Lawrence opens the bag and finds the money replaced with a note revealing that Janet is the Jackal, a prominent American con artist. Freddy is furious but Lawrence takes delight in having been so skillfully deceived. A week later, Freddy and Lawrence contemplate their loss at Lawrence's villa. A group of wealthy tourists arrive led by Janet, who is posing as a high-value real estate agent. While the tourists head to the villa, Janet tells Lawrence and Freddy that, while she made millions in the last year, taking their money was the most fun. Lawrence and Freddy assume their roles in Janet's plot as the trio prepares to scam their latest victims.

Clyde Shelton lives with his wife and daughter in Philadelphia when two burglars break into their home one night. Rupert Ames, who only intended to steal, ties up and gags Clyde, and pleads with Clarence Darby to leave, but Darby silences Ames and stabs Clyde in the stomach before gagging his wife, raping and killing her and their daughter in front of him. Prosecutor Nick Rice is assigned to the case along with District Attorney Jonas Cantrell. Upon learning that the DNA evidence is inconclusive in linking Darby to the crime, Nick is unwilling to risk lowering his high conviction rate and agrees to a plea bargain. Clyde begs Nick not to make a deal with Darby, but he does so anyway, boldly claiming that it is a victory. Darby testifies against Ames, who is convicted of felony murder and is sentenced to death, while Darby pleads guilty to third-degree murder and serves only three years in prison before being released on parole. During a press conference, Darby thanks Nick for helping him and shakes his hand as Clyde watches from afar. Ten years later, Ames expresses remorse for his role in the burglary, but maintains his innocence in the murders. Ames is executed via lethal injection, but the procedure goes awry and he unexpectedly dies screaming and writhing in pain. Nick and Cantrell, who witnessed the botched execution, learn that the drugs were replaced with an anticonvulsant. Meanwhile, Darby is warned by an anonymous caller that the police are coming and instructs him to flee his apartment and take an officer hostage. The officer is revealed to be Clyde in disguise, who intentionally lured Darby into a trap and had the real officer locked inside the trunk of the car. Darby attempts to shoot Clyde, but as he pulls the trigger, he is paralyzed with tetrodotoxin coated spikes hidden inside the handle. Clyde records himself torturing and killing Darby as he is strapped to a table. After Darby's dismembered remains are found inside an abandoned warehouse owned by Clyde, he is arrested as he locks eyes with Nick. During his interrogation, Nick confronts Clyde for mailing a DVD copy of Darby's murder to Nick's daughter Denise. Clyde represents himself at his bail hearing, where Judge Laura Burch, who previously presided over Darby's plea deal, initially grants Clyde bail. When Clyde accuses Judge Burch of being too easily swayed by legal doctrine and willing to release a potential criminal, she holds him in contempt of court and has his bail denied. After Clyde gives his confession, he demands a steak lunch from Del Frisco's and his iPod be delivered to his prison cell at 1:00 p.m. in exchange for the location of Darby's lawyer, Bill Reynolds, who was reported missing by his wife three days earlier. Nick agrees to the deal, but after missing Clyde's deadline, Reynolds is found buried alive with a precisely-timed oxygen device strapped to him. Simultaneously, Clyde stabs his cellmate to death while eating his lunch, forcing him to be moved to solitary confinement. Suspicious of Clyde's skills, Nick and Cantrell meet with Bray, a CIA contact who reveals that Clyde previously worked for the agency and specialized in unorthodox assassinations. Bray warns Nick and Cantrell that the only way to stop Clyde is to kill him. During a meeting, Nick and Cantrell persuade Judge Burch to temporarily suspend Clyde's civil rights. Judge Burch answers her cellphone, but she is killed by an explosive device hidden inside. When Nick confronts Clyde, he explains that the murders are not about revenge, but the failures of the criminal justice system. Clyde tells Nick that he will end the killings by 6:00 a.m. if he is released from prison and all charges against him are dropped. Nick takes precautionary measures instead, moving his entire legal team to an office at the prison to work throughout the night. After Clyde's deadline passes without incident, Nick allows his team to go home. While walking to his car, six attorneys from Cantrell's office, including Nick's assistant, Sarah Lowell, are killed in car bombings. Consequently, Mayor April Henry assigns two security guards to protect both Nick and Cantrell. While leaving Sarah's funeral, Cantrell and the security guards are killed by a weaponized bomb disposal robot armed with automatic target recognition and a missile. Nick prepares to resign when Mayor Henry considers firing him, but she instead promotes him to acting District Attorney and puts the city in lockdown. After Nick learns that Clyde owns a building near the prison, he and Detective Dunnigan discover a tunnel inside that leads to a cache of guns, disguises, and other equipment below the solitary confinement cells, with secret entrances to each cell. Nick realizes that Clyde intentionally sought solitary confinement, allowing him to leave the prison undetected. Clyde arrives disguised as a janitor at City Hall, where Mayor Henry is holding an emergency meeting, and passes through security. Nick and Dunnigan fail to find Clyde, but they discover a suitcase bomb loaded with napalm planted in the room below the meeting. When Clyde returns to his cell and finds Nick waiting for him, Clyde tries to make another deal, but Nick refuses, having finally learned his lesson. Nick unsuccessfully urges Clyde not to activate the bomb before leaving, but he hears the detonator beeping and discovers the bomb hidden underneath his bed. Clyde briefly smiles and sits down, holding and looking at his daughter's handmade bracelet as the bomb explodes. Nick, officially the District Attorney, joins his wife Kelly at Denise's cello recital, having previously failed to do so.

In 1977 Los Angeles, Holland March is a private eye hired by Mrs. Glenn to find her niece, porn star Misty Mountains, who she claims to have seen after her death. March's investigation leads him to Amelia Kuttner. A fearful Amelia pays Jackson Healy, a violent enforcer, to scare March away. After visiting March at his home and breaking his arm, he accepts a Yoo-hoo from March's teenage daughter, Holly, as he leaves. When Healy returns home (with a case of Yoo-hoo), he is interrogated by two thugs, "Blueface" —so named after he sets off a dye pack while searching Healy's apartment—and Older Guy, about Amelia. Believing Amelia is in danger, Healy wards them off and teams up with a reluctant March to find her. The duo visit Amelia's anti-pollution protest group and meet Chet, who brings them to the burnt-down house of Amelia's boyfriend Dean, who died in the fire. They learn that Amelia and Dean were working with Misty on an "experimental film" combining pornography and investigative journalism. The two infiltrate a party to search for the film's financier, Sid Shattuck. At the party, Healy discovers the film is missing, while March stumbles upon Shattuck's dead body and crosses paths with Amelia. Holly, having snuck along to the party, stops Blueface from killing Amelia. Blueface is struck in a hit-and-run and Amelia flees. Healy subdues Older Guy and finds Blueface dying. Blueface tells Healy that his boss has dispatched a hit man named John Boy to kill all witnesses. Healy discreetly kills Blueface by strangling him. The police arrive at the scene. March and Healy are met by Amelia's mother Judith Kuttner, a high-ranking official in the Justice Department. Judith claims Amelia is delusional and hires them to find her, for which March demands US$5,000 in payment. March and Healy go to an airport hotel where Amelia is meeting with distributors for the film. However, John Boy has arrived ahead of them and is slaughtering the distributors. The duo hastily retreat, only for Amelia to land on their car and accidentally knock herself unconscious. They take her to March's house, where she accuses her mother of colluding with car makers to suppress the catalytic converter, which regulates exhaust emissions. Amelia created the film to expose their collusion and believes her mother has been killing everyone connected to the film. A disbelieving March calls Tally, Judith's assistant, and tells her Amelia has been found. Tally tells him the family's doctor will arrive to check on Amelia. At the same time, she tasks them with delivering a briefcase of money to Judith. March accidentally crashes his car during the delivery, causing the briefcase to fly open, spilling out shredded paper; the delivery was really a diversion to draw them away from Amelia. John Boy arrives at March's house disguised as the family doctor, attacks Holly and her friend Jessica, and engages in a shootout with the returning March and Healy. As John Boy evades the police, Amelia flees the house and unwittingly flags down his car only to be shot and killed. The police question and release March and Healy, who have no evidence that Judith is behind the murders. March realizes that Mrs. Glenn saw Misty in a film projected against a wall. At Misty's house, they discover a film projector, with no film. They realize that Chet is the projectionist for the Los Angeles Auto Show and will try to screen the film at the event. At the auto show, Tally intercepts Healy and March at gunpoint. Holly distracts Tally, who is knocked unconscious. Amelia's film, which Chet spliced into the auto show presentation, implicates the auto executives. On the rooftop, March struggles with Older Guy; they both fall from the roof, but March lands in the pool while Older Guy falls to his death. Holly stops Tally from reaching the film. Healy overpowers John Boy, but spares his life at Holly's behest and March secures the film from thugs sent by the auto executives. Judith is arrested, but insists that it was Detroit who wanted Amelia dead; she hired March and Healy to keep Amelia safe. Judith remarks that while she will go to prison, Detroit has still gotten away with trying to suppress the catalytic converter. At a bar on Christmas Eve, March shows Healy an advertisement for their new detective agency called "The Nice Guys".

An American family – Dr. Ben McKenna, his wife, popular singer Jo Conway, and their son Hank – are vacationing in French Morocco. Traveling from Casablanca to Marrakesh, they meet Frenchman Louis Bernard. He seems friendly, but Jo is suspicious of his many questions and evasive answers. Bernard offers to take the McKennas to dinner, but cancels when a suspicious-looking man knocks at the McKennas' hotel-room door. At a restaurant, the McKennas meet friendly English couple Lucy and Edward Drayton. The McKennas are surprised to see Bernard arrive and sit elsewhere, apparently ignoring them. The next day, visiting the local marketplace with the Draytons, the McKennas see a man chased by police. After being stabbed in the back, the man approaches Ben, who discovers he is Bernard in disguise. The dying Bernard whispers that a foreign statesman will be assassinated in London and that Ben must tell the authorities about "Ambrose Chappell". Lucy returns Hank to the hotel while Ben, Jo and Edward go to a police station for questioning about Bernard's death. An officer explains that Bernard was a French Intelligence agent. Ben receives a phone call at the police station; Hank has been kidnapped but will not be harmed if the McKennas say nothing to the police about Bernard's warning. Knowing Hank was left in Lucy's care, Ben dispatches Edward to locate him. When Ben and Jo return to the hotel, they discover Edward checked out. Ben realizes the Draytons are the couple Bernard was looking for and are involved in Hank's abduction. When he learns the Draytons are from London, he decides he and Jo should go there and try to find them through Ambrose Chappell. In London, Scotland Yard 's Inspector Buchanan tells Jo and Ben that Bernard was in Morocco to uncover an assassination plot; they are instructed to contact him if they hear from the kidnappers. Leaving Jo's friends in their hotel suite, the McKennas search for a person named Ambrose Chappell. Jo realizes that "Ambrose Chapel" is a place, and the McKennas arrive at the chapel to find Edward leading a service. Jo leaves the chapel to call the police. After Edward sends his congregation home, Ben confronts him and is knocked out and locked inside. Jo arrives with the police, but they cannot enter without a warrant. Jo learns that Buchanan has gone to a concert at the Royal Albert Hall, and asks the police to take her there. Once the police and Jo leave, the Draytons take Hank to a foreign embassy. In the Royal Albert Hall lobby, Jo sees the man who came to her door in Marrakesh. When he threatens to harm Hank if she interferes, she realizes he is the assassin sent to kill the foreign prime minister. Ben escapes the chapel through its bell tower and reaches the Royal Albert Hall, where Jo points out the assassin. Ben searches the balcony boxes for the killer, who is waiting for a cymbal crash to mask his gunshot. Just before the cymbals crash, Jo screams and the assassin misses his mark, only wounding his target. Ben struggles with the would-be killer, who falls to his death. Concluding that Hank is likely to be at the embassy, but that it is sovereign and exempt from an investigation, the McKennas secure an invitation from the grateful prime minister. The ambassador organized the plot to kill the prime minister, and blames the failed attempt on the Draytons. Knowing that Hank can testify against them, he orders the Draytons to kill the boy. The prime minister asks Jo to sing. She loudly performs " Que Sera, Sera ", so that Hank will hear her. Lucy, who is guarding Hank while Edward prepares to murder him, is distressed at the prospect of killing a child, so she encourages the boy to whistle along with the song. Ben finds Hank. Edward tries escaping with them at gunpoint, but when Ben hits him, he falls down the stairs to his death. The McKennas return to their hotel suite. Ben explains to Jo's now-sleeping friends, "I'm sorry we were gone so long, but we had to go over and pick up Hank."