During the winter on the Wind River Indian Reservation, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Agent Cory Lambert discovers the frozen body of 18-year-old Natalie Hanson of the Northern Arapaho tribe. FBI special agent Jane Banner arrives to investigate the possible homicide. Banner learns from Natalie's father, Martin, that his daughter was dating a new boyfriend whose name he does not know. Natalie's autopsy shows signs of blunt trauma and rape and confirms Lambert's deduction that Natalie died from pulmonary hemorrhage caused by inhaling subzero air. The medical examiner refuses to classify the death as a homicide, so Banner cannot get additional help from her supervisors. Lambert is informed by Natalie's brother Chip that Natalie's boyfriend is Matt Rayburn, a security guard at a nearby oil-drilling site. Lambert and Banner soon find Matt's naked, mutilated body in the snow. Lambert reveals to Banner that his 16-year-old daughter Emily, Natalie's best friend, died in a similar manner to Natalie three years earlier, and the case remains unsolved. Banner, tribal police Chief Ben Shoyo, and other law enforcement officers visit the drilling site, where Curtis, the security supervisor, and several security guards meet them. They claim Matt left a few days prior, following an argument with Natalie. One guard mentions they heard about Natalie's body being found, and Banner states that Natalie's name has not been released to the public. The guards claim they learned it by monitoring a police scanner. One of Banner's team notices the guards slowly surrounding them and draws his weapon. The confrontation quickly escalates into an armed standoff, which Banner defuses. In a flashback, Matt's drunken colleagues barge into his trailer while he is in bed with Natalie. Matt is provoked to violence, and the other guards continue the attack while one guard, Pete, rapes Natalie. Matt is beaten to death, but his attempt to fight back allows Natalie to try to escape by running cross-country to the mobile home where her brother lives. In the present, Lambert traces the tracks from where Matt's corpse was found back to the drilling camp. As Banner and the others approach Pete's trailer, Lambert radios a warning to Shoyo. Pete responds to a veiled warning from Curtis by firing a shotgun through the door, wounding Banner. A gunfight ensues, and Shoyo and the other officers are killed. As the remaining guards prepare to execute Banner, Lambert kills four with his rifle. A wounded Pete flees on foot, but Lambert apprehends him. At Gannett Peak, Lambert forces Pete to confess before offering him the same chance Natalie had: try to stay alive by running to a distant road barefoot and wearing lightweight clothing. Pete runs but quickly succumbs as his lungs give out from the frigid air. Lambert visits Banner in the hospital and praises her toughness. He visits with Martin and they share grief over the deaths of their daughters. A title card reads, " While missing person statistics are compiled for every other demographic, none exist for Native American women. "

Professional thief Danny Ocean is released after four years in a New Jersey prison. He travels to Los Angeles and reunites with friend and colleague Rusty Ryan. They travel to Las Vegas to secure financial backing from wealthy friend Reuben Tishkoff for a multi-million dollar heist to rob three casinos owned by Tishkoff's ruthless rival, Terry Benedict. These are the Bellagio, the Mirage, and the MGM Grand. Legally required to have enough cash to cover all casino patrons' bets, Danny estimates that during an upcoming high-profile boxing match, the casinos will hold over $150 million in an underground vault guarded by virtually unassailable security measures and systems. Having been forced out of his casino by Benedict, Tishkoff readily agrees to participate. Danny and Rusty recruit eight accomplices: con man Frank Catton, retired con man Saul Bloom, auto specialists Virgil and Turk Malloy, explosives expert Basher Tarr, surveillance technician Livingston Dell, acrobat Yen, and pickpocket Linus Caldwell. A precise replica of the vault is built to practice the heist, and team members are assigned to infiltrate or surveil the Bellagio to assess the security, staff routines, and the building's layout. Linus, tasked with tracking Benedict, discovers he is dating Danny's ex-wife, Tess. Believing Danny's motive is driven by wanting to reunite with Tess, Rusty wants to call off the heist, but Danny refuses. Danny later meets with Tess, who is still hurting from their failed relationship, and also Benedict, who has Danny barred from his casinos. The team commences the heist while Danny enters the Bellagio. Benedict has him detained in a surveillance-free room to be beaten by Bruiser, who secretly works with Danny. Danny reaches the vault elevator through the vent and meets up with Linus, who has infiltrated the casino as a state gaming official. Meanwhile, Saul, disguised as a wealthy foreigner, persuades Benedict to secure a briefcase containing jewels—actually disguised explosives—in the casino vault. Virgil and Turk smuggle Yen into the vault in a casino trolley. Basher triggers a stolen EMP device which disables electricity across Las Vegas, including the laser grid protecting the elevator shaft, allowing Danny and Linus to descend to the vault entrance. The pair neutralizes the guards and, with Yen, use Saul's explosive "jewels" to destroy the vault locks and secure the cash. Rusty calls Benedict and reveals the robbery, blackmailing him to surrender half the cash to a van waiting outside or else all the money will be blown up. Verifying the compromised vault by camera, Benedict complies, but has his men pursue the van while summoning a SWAT team to retake the vault. During the SWAT team's assault the explosives are detonated, destroying the remaining half of the cash while the thieves seemingly escape. Meanwhile, the van is discovered to be under remote control and the money bags filled with paper advertisements. Benedict dismisses the SWAT team before realizing that the video footage was faked because the Bellagio logo, a recent addition, was not on the vault's floor; the footage was from the team's replica vault. It is revealed that, after intercepting the 911 call, the team entered the casino disguised as SWAT members and left the vault with duffel bags containing over $160 million in cash. Danny returns to the secure room before Benedict arrives to confront him. Tess receives a call telling her to watch her TV which shows a surveillance camera feed of Danny tricking Benedict into admitting that he would give up Tess in exchange for the money's return. Unable to connect Danny to the heist, Benedict instead gets him arrested for parole violation; Danny and Tess reconcile before he is taken away. As dawn breaks, the remaining team contemplates their victory before going their separate ways. Several months later, Danny is released from prison and picked up by Rusty and Tess. They drive off, knowingly followed by Benedict's men.

An 18-year-old boy and his girlfriend walk home from church. The boy gets abducted and then stripped naked. When the boy's family paid the ransom, he was dumped on a highway with an ear cut off. In December 2003, former Force-Recon Marine and CIA SAD/SOG officer John Creasy travels to Mexico to visit his old friend Paul Rayburn, who convinces him to take a bodyguard position with Samuel Ramos, a wealthy Mexico City automaker. He needs protection for his young daughter, Lupita "Pita" Ramos, due to a kidnapping insurance policy that requires a bodyguard to be in place. Struggling with alcoholism and guilt from his past, Creasy attempts suicide with his own handgun, but a failed 9mm primer prompts him to eject the round, preserve it, and reconsider his fate. Revitalized by the thought that he is meant to live, he takes on his role as Pita's protector, reducing his drinking and finding solace in the Bible. As he bonds with the child, coaching her competitive swimming, their relationship flourishes. One day, while waiting outside Pita's piano lesson, Creasy recognizes a car that has been following them. As two federal policemen block the street, he realizes Pita is about to be kidnapped. Creasy engages the attackers, killing four but sustaining serious injuries while Pita is abducted. As authorities investigate, Creasy becomes a suspect, but Reforma reporter Mariana Garcia Guerrero questions the narrative. Federal police officer Miguel Manzano relocates him to a veterinary clinic to protect him from corrupt officials. The kidnappers, led by the unseen "Voice", demand a $10 million ransom, which Samuel complies with, aided by Police Lieutenant Victor Fuentes. However, when the ransom drop is ambushed and the Voice's nephew is killed, the Voice threatens the Ramos family, stating that it is "too late" and Pita will be lost forever as retribution. Manzano warns Creasy about the powerful "brotherhood" involved, composed of corrupt officials and criminals, and Creasy vows to kill everyone connected to the kidnapping. With Rayburn's help, Creasy assembles an arsenal and begins his quest for revenge. He brutally interrogates the getaway driver for information, leading him to confront several kidnappers and recover incriminating evidence. Garcia Guerrero discovers Fuentes's involvement in the brotherhood, prompting her and Manzano to assist Creasy in his mission. Creasy's rampage intensifies as he confronts Fuentes, learning that Samuel's lawyer, Jordan Kalfus, orchestrated the kidnapping to claim insurance money. Creasy arrives to confront Kalfus at his house but finds the lawyer's beheaded corpse floating in the pool. He then confronts Samuel about his involvement with the kidnapping and the ruse is revealed: Samuel and Kalfus agreed to orchestrate the kidnapping in order to pay off old debts belonging to the former's father. Both had expected Lupita to be safely returned by paying off the ransom with the remaining insurance money. However, the ambush by Fuentes caused the plan to collapse, with Samuel killing Kalfus in a rage. Despondent over this revelation, Creasy gives Samuel a gun and the bullet he once used in his suicide attempt. Samuel kills himself as Creasy leaves. Garcia Guerrero and Manzano trace the ransom money and uncover the Voice's identity. Creasy captures the Voice's brother, who shoots him during the melee. Creasy learns the ringleader's real name is Daniel Sanchez. They arrange an exchange for Pita, and during the meeting, Creasy, injured but determined, reassures her of his love before she is sent to safety. As Creasy is taken away to the Voice, he dies of his injuries en route; later that day, Manzano executes the Voice during the latter's arrest.

In the summer of 1937, three convicts – Pete, Delmar, and Everett – escape from a Mississippi chain gang to retrieve a buried treasure hidden by Everett before the area is flooded to make a lake. The three are assisted by a blind man driving a handcar on a railroad, who prophetically tells them they will find a different fortune than the one they seek. The trio then travels to Pete's cousin, Wash, who breaks off their shackles, feeds them, and allows them to sleep in his barn. While they are sleeping, Wash reports them to Sheriff Cooley, who torches the barn with his men. Wash's son helps the trio escape. Pete and Delmar get baptized in a river the next day, but Everett refuses to join them. The group then picks up Tommy Johnson, a young black man who claims that he sold his soul to the devil in exchange for the ability to play the guitar. In need of money, the four stop at a radio station, where they record a rendition of " Man of Constant Sorrow " as the "Soggy Bottom Boys". That night, the trio parts ways with Tommy after their car is discovered by the police. They then briefly fall in with outlaw George "Baby Face" Nelson, who has been robbing banks and killing cows, but after becoming depressed, George gives the trio his cash and walks off. Unbeknownst to the trio, their radio recording becomes a major hit. Near a river, the group hears singing and finds three women washing clothes. The women give them corn whiskey and they lose consciousness. Upon waking, Delmar finds Pete's clothes lying next to him, empty except for a frog. Delmar is convinced the women were sirens who transformed Pete into a frog, and so takes the frog with them. Later, one-eyed Bible salesman Big Dan invites them for a picnic lunch, then mugs the men and kills the frog. On their way to Everett's hometown, Everett and Delmar glimpse Pete working on a chain gang. They arrive in town in the midst of a campaign rally for Homer Stokes, the challenger in the upcoming gubernatorial election. Everett confronts his wife Penny, who told their daughters that he was hit by a train. He gets into a fight with Vernon, her new suitor and Stokes' campaign manager. While recovering at a movie theater, Everett and Delmar encounter a group of prisoners including Pete, who warns them that an ambush has been set up at the treasure site. That night, they sneak into Pete's holding cell and free him. Pete confesses that he gave up the treasure's location to the police under torture, but Everett then confesses that he made up the treasure to convince the men he was chained with to escape with him, so that he could stop his wife from getting remarried. Pete, enraged, fights with Everett until the trio stumble into a Ku Klux Klan rally, presided over by Homer Stokes as its Grand Wizard, and find that the Klan has captured Tommy to lynch him. The trio disguise themselves as Klansmen and attempt to rescue Tommy, but they are unmasked by Big Dan. Chaos ensues as the trio rush Tommy away and cut the supports of a large burning cross, which falls on Big Dan. Everett persuades Pete, Delmar, and Tommy to help him win his wife back. Disguised as hillbilly musicians, they sneak into a Stokes campaign gala dinner that she is attending and perform "Man of Constant Sorrow", unaware that the Soggy Bottom Boys are famous. The crowd is electrified, but Stokes recognizes them from the KKK rally and interrupts the performance. When he demands the group be arrested and reveals his white supremacist views, the crowd runs him out of town on a rail. Pappy O'Daniel, the incumbent governor, seizes the opportunity to endorse the Soggy Bottom Boys, grant them full pardons, and hire them as his "brain trust". Penny agrees to remarry Everett as long as he finds her original ring. The group then encounters an exuberant George Nelson as he is paraded through town by a mob on his way to be executed. The next morning, the group arrives at Everett's cabin in the valley, which Everett had previously claimed was the location of the treasure. They are ambushed by Sheriff Cooley and his deputies, who have been lying in wait. Dismissing their claims that they had received pardons, Cooley orders their hanging. As Everett prays to God, the valley is flooded, killing the officers and saving the group, who survive by floating on top of their own coffins. Tommy finds a ring in the flotsam and they return to town, but when Everett presents the ring to Penny, she claims it is not hers and firmly insists that she will not marry Everett without the original ring. As Everett belligerently pursues her, the blind handcar driver passes by on the railroad tracks.

Former Green Beret and retired CIA officer Bryan Mills attempts to build a closer relationship with his 17-year-old daughter, Kim, who lives with her mother, Lenore, and her wealthy step-father, Stuart. While overseeing security at a concert for pop star Sheerah, Bryan saves her from a knife-wielding attacker. Sheerah gratefully offers to have her vocal coach assess Kim, an aspiring singer. Meanwhile, Kim needs Bryan's written permission to visit Paris with her friend, Amanda. Though concerned about Kim's safety, Bryan, pressured by Lenore, reluctantly agrees. At the airport, Bryan learns that Kim and Amanda are actually planning to follow U2 during their European tour. Upon arriving at Charles de Gaulle Airport, Kim and Amanda meet Peter, who offers to share a taxi. Kim and Amanda arrive at her cousins' apartment, where Kim unexpectedly finds that they are vacationing in Spain. While talking with Bryan on her cell phone, Kim sees men entering the apartment and abducting Amanda. Upon instructions from her father, Kim yells out her captor's descriptions as she is taken. Bryan tells the kidnappers that he will avoid pursuing them if they release Kim, but threatens them with death if they fail to comply. The listener only replies, "good luck", and terminates the call. Bryan's former colleague, Sam, deduces the kidnappers belong to an Albanian sex trafficking ring, and identifies the recorded voice as mob boss Marko Hoxha. Based on previous abductions, if Kim is not found within 96 hours, it is not likely Bryan will find her again. Bryan flies to Paris. At the apartment, he finds Kim's phone and checks the photos, identifying Peter, the spotter, in a reflection. Bryan locates and apprehends Peter at the airport attempting to lure another young victim, but Peter breaks free after one of his associates attacks Bryan. In the ensuing pursuit, Peter inadvertently walks into oncoming traffic and is killed by an oncoming truck. With his only lead dead, Bryan contacts Jean-Claude Pitrel, an ex- DGSE agent turned National Police officer. Jean-Claude informs him about the local red-light district where the Albanians operate but warns Bryan to avoid getting involved. Bryan plants a listening device on an Albanian pimp, and with help from a hired translator, is led to a makeshift brothel in a construction yard. He rescues a drugged young woman who has Kim's denim jacket, causing a violent gunfight that kills several sex traffickers. Bryan takes the woman to a hotel and improvises her detoxification. The next morning, the woman informs Bryan about a safehouse where she and Kim were kept. Posing as Jean-Claude, Bryan infiltrates under the pretence of renegotiating the police protection rate. When Bryan identifies Marko by his voice, the meeting erupts into a fight, which results in several terrorists being killed. Searching the house, Bryan finds Amanda, who died from overdose. Bryan tortures Marko with electricity into revealing that virgins like Kim are sold on the black market, identifying her buyer as crime syndicate terrorist Patrice Saint-Clair. Bryan leaves Marko to die from continuous electrocution. After a vicious confrontation with Jean-Claude over his corruption in order to disclose Saint-Clair's location, Bryan infiltrates a clandestine sex slave auction occurring beneath Saint-Clair's mansion. Witnessing Kim as the last sale, Bryan forces an Arab bidder to purchase her but is subsequently caught and subdued. Saint-Clair orders him killed, but Bryan breaks loose and eliminates all the henchmen; a mortally wounded Saint-Clair reveals Kim was delivered to a nearby yacht before Bryan murders him. Boarding the vessel, Bryan eliminates the bodyguards and breaks into a bedroom where a sheikh is holding Kim at knifepoint. He kills the sheikh and saves Kim. They return to the US and are reunited with Lenore and Stuart. Bryan surprises Kim by taking her to visit Sheerah.

College student Jeffrey Beaumont returns to his suburban hometown of Lumberton, North Carolina, after his father, Tom, has a near-fatal stroke. Walking home from the hospital, Jeffrey cuts through a vacant lot and discovers a severed human ear, which he takes to police detective John Williams. Williams's daughter Sandy tells Jeffrey that the ear somehow relates to a lounge singer named Dorothy Vallens. Intrigued, Jeffrey enters her apartment by posing as a pest exterminator. While there, he steals a spare key while she is distracted by a man in a distinctive yellow sport coat, whom Jeffrey nicknames the "Yellow Man". Jeffrey and Sandy attend Dorothy's nightclub act, in which she sings " Blue Velvet ", and leave early so Jeffrey can break into her apartment. Dorothy returns home and undresses; she finds Jeffrey hiding in a closet and forces him to strip at knifepoint, but he retreats to the closet when Frank Booth, a psychopathic gangster and drug lord, arrives and interrupts their encounter. Frank beats and rapes Dorothy while inhaling gas from a canister, alternating between fits of sobbing and violent rage. After Frank leaves, Jeffrey sneaks away and seeks comfort from Sandy. Surmising that Frank has abducted Dorothy's husband Don, and son Donnie, to force her into sexual slavery, Jeffrey suspects that Frank cut off Don's ear to intimidate her into submission. While continuing to see Sandy, Jeffrey enters into a sadomasochistic relationship with Dorothy, in which she encourages him to hit her. Jeffrey sees Frank attending Dorothy's show and later observes him selling drugs and meeting with the Yellow Man. Jeffrey then sees the Yellow Man meeting with a "well-dressed man". When Frank catches Jeffrey leaving Dorothy's apartment, he abducts them and takes them to the lair of Ben, a criminal associate holding Don and Donnie hostage. Frank permits Dorothy to see her family and forces Jeffrey to watch Ben perform an impromptu lip-sync of Roy Orbison 's " In Dreams ", which moves Frank to tears. Afterwards, he and his gang take Jeffrey and Dorothy on a high-speed joyride to a sawmill yard, where he again attempts to sexually abuse Dorothy. When Jeffrey intervenes and punches him in the face, an enraged Frank and his gang pull him out of the car. Replaying the tape of "In Dreams", Frank smears lipstick on his face and violently kisses Jeffrey. Frank then has Jeffrey restrained and beats him unconscious, while Dorothy pleads for Frank to stop. Jeffrey awakens the next morning, bruised and bloodied. While visiting the police station, Jeffrey discovers that the Yellow Man is Detective Williams's partner Tom Gordon, who has been murdering Frank's rival drug dealers and stealing confiscated narcotics from the evidence room for Frank to sell. After Jeffrey and Sandy declare their love for each other at a party, they are pursued by a car which they assume belongs to Frank; as they arrive at Jeffrey's home, Sandy realizes the driver is her ex-boyfriend, Mike. After Mike threatens to beat Jeffrey for stealing his girlfriend, Dorothy appears on Jeffrey's porch naked, beaten, and confused. Mike backs down as Jeffrey and Sandy whisk Dorothy to Sandy's house to summon medical attention. When Dorothy calls Jeffrey "my secret lover", a distraught Sandy slaps him for cheating on her. Jeffrey asks Sandy to tell her father everything, and Detective Williams then leads a police raid on Frank's headquarters, killing Frank's men. Jeffrey returns alone to Dorothy's apartment, where he discovers Don dead and with his ear missing, and Gordon in a lobotomised state from being shot in the head. As Jeffrey leaves the apartment, the "Well-Dressed Man" arrives, sees Jeffrey in the stairs, and chases him back inside. Jeffrey uses Gordon's walkie-talkie to say he is in the bedroom before hiding in the closet. The "Well-Dressed Man" arrives at the apartment and Jeffrey observes he is actually Frank in disguise. Frank begins searching the apartment, and kills Gordon in the process. Jeffrey sneaks out of the closet and grabs Gordon's gun, which he uses to kill Frank when he opens the door. Moments later, Sandy and Detective Williams arrive. Some time later, Jeffrey and Sandy have continued their relationship, Tom Beaumont has recovered, and Dorothy has been reunited with her son.

In New York City, four men wearing similar disguises and carrying concealed weapons board the same downtown 6 train, "Pelham 1-2-3," at different stations. Using their code names Mr. Blue, Mr. Green, Mr. Grey and Mr. Brown, they take eighteen people, including the conductor and an off-duty undercover police officer, hostage in the front car. Communicating over the radio with New York City Transit Police lieutenant Zachary Garber, Blue demands that a $1 million ransom be delivered within exactly one hour or he will kill one hostage for every minute it is late. Green sneezes periodically, to which Garber always responds, " Gesundheit." Garber, Lt. Rico Patrone and others cooperate while speculating about the hijackers' escape plan. Garber surmises that one hijacker must be a former motorman because the hijackers uncoupled the head car and parked it farther down the tunnel below 28th Street. Conversations between the hijackers reveal that Blue is a former British Army colonel and was a mercenary in Africa; Green was a motorman who lost his job after being caught in a drug bust; and Blue does not trust Grey, who was ousted from the Mafia for being erratic. Unexpectedly, Grey guns down a transit supervisor from Grand Central as he approaches the hijacked train. The ransom is transported uptown in a speeding police car that crashes well before arriving at 28th Street. As the deadline is reached, Garber bluffs Blue by claiming that the money has reached the station entrance and just has to be walked down the tunnel to the train. Meanwhile, a police motorcycle arrives with the ransom. As two patrolmen carry the money down the tunnel, one of the many police snipers in the tunnel shoots at Brown, and the hijackers exchange gunfire with them. In retaliation, Blue kills the conductor. The money is delivered and divided among the hijackers. Blue orders Garber to restore power to the subway line, set the signals to green all the way to South Ferry, and clear the police from stations along the route. Before this is done, however, Green moves the train farther south. When Garber becomes alarmed, Blue explains that he wanted more distance from the police inside the tunnel. The hijackers override the dead man's switch so that the train will run without anyone at the controls. Garber joins Inspector Daniels above ground where the train stopped. The hijackers set the train in motion and get off. As they walk to the tunnel's emergency exit, the off-duty undercover officer jumps off the train and hides between the rails. Unaware that the hijackers have left the train, Garber and Daniels drive south above its route. With no one at the controls, the train gains speed. The hijackers collect their disguises and weapons for disposal, but Grey refuses to surrender his gun, resulting in a stand-off with Blue, who kills him. The undercover officer kills Brown and exchanges fire with Blue while Green escapes through an emergency exit onto the street. Garber, contemplating the train's suspicious last movement, concludes that the hijackers have bypassed the dead man's switch and are no longer on board. He returns to where the train had stopped, enters the same emergency exit from street level, and confronts Blue before he kills the undercover cop. With no escape, Blue deliberately steps against the third rail and electrocutes himself. Meanwhile, Pelham 1-2-3 hurtles through the southbound tunnel. When it enters the South Ferry loop, its speed triggers the automatic safeties. The train screeches to a halt, leaving the hostages bruised but safe. Since none of the dead hijackers was a motorman, Garber infers that the lone survivor must be. Working their way through a list of recently discharged motormen, Garber and Patrone knock on the door of Harold Longman (Green). After hastily hiding the loot, Longman lets them in, bluffs his way through their interrogation and complains indignantly about being suspected. Garber vows to return with a search warrant. As Garber closes the apartment door behind him, Longman sneezes, and Garber reflexively says "Gesundheit," as he had over the radio. Garber re-opens the door and gives Longman a caustic stare.