In Marseille, a man is shadowing Alain Charnier, who runs a heroin-smuggling syndicate. Charnier's hitman, Pierre Nicoli, murders the man. Charnier plans to smuggle US$ 32 million (equivalent to $ 189 million in 2025) worth of 89% pure heroin into the United States by hiding it in the car of his unsuspecting friend, television personality Henri Devereaux, who is traveling to New York City by ship. In Brooklyn, police detectives Jimmy "Popeye" Doyle dressed as Santa Claus and Buddy "Cloudy" Russo stake out a bar known for drug trafficking. They later go out for drinks at the Copacabana. Popeye observes Salvatore "Sal" Boca and his wife, Angie, entertaining mobsters involved in narcotics. They tail the couple and establish a link between the Bocas and Joel Weinstock, a financier in the narcotics underworld. Popeye learns that a shipment of heroin will arrive soon. The detectives convince their supervisor to wiretap the Bocas' phones. Popeye and Cloudy are joined by federal agents Mulderig and Klein. Devereaux's vehicle arrives in New York City. Boca is in a hurry to make the purchase, but Weinstock urges patience, knowing they are being surveilled. Charnier realizes he is being surveilled as well, identifies Popeye as a detective, and escapes on a departing subway shuttle at Grand Central Station. To evade Popeye, he has Boca meet him in Washington, D.C., where Boca asks for a delay to avoid the police. Charnier wants to conclude the deal quickly. On the flight back to New York City, Nicoli offers to kill Popeye, but Charnier says Popeye would just be replaced by another policeman. Nicoli insists, however, saying they will be back in France before a replacement is assigned. Soon, Nicoli attempts to snipe Popeye in Brooklyn but hits a bystander. Popeye chases Nicoli, who boards an elevated subway train. Popeye shouts to a policeman on the train to catch Nicoli and then commandeers a passing car. He gives chase, crashing into several vehicles on the way. Realizing he is being pursued, Nicoli shoots the policeman who tries to intervene and hijacks the train at gunpoint, shooting the conductor while forcing the motorman to drive through the next station. The motorman suffers a heart attack, and the train stop engages before it rear ends another train, hurling Nicoli to the floor. Popeye arrives and sees Nicoli descending from the platform. Nicoli sees Popeye and turns to run, but Popeye shoots him dead. After a long stakeout, Popeye impounds Devereaux's Lincoln. In a police garage, mechanics tear the car apart in a search for drugs, initially coming up empty-handed. Cloudy discovers that the car's weight was recorded at 120 pounds over its standard, implying that the contraband must still be in the car – packages of heroin are finally discovered beneath the rocker panels. The car is reassembled, despite being nearly destroyed, and returned to Devereaux who delivers it to Charnier. Charnier drives to an old factory on Wards Island, where Boca's brother Lou works, to meet Weinstock and deliver the drugs. After Charnier has the rocker panel covers removed, Weinstock's chemist tests one of the bags and confirms its quality. Charnier removes the drugs and hides the money inside the rocker panels of another car purchased at a junk car auction, which he plans to take back to France. Charnier and Sal drive off in the Lincoln, but a large contingent of police led by Popeye blocks their path. The police chase the Lincoln back to the factory, where Boca is killed by Cloudy during a shootout. Most of the other criminals surrender. Charnier escapes into a nearby abandoned bakery with Popeye and Cloudy in pursuit. Popeye sees a shadowy figure in the distance and opens fire too late to heed a warning, killing Mulderig. Undaunted, he tells Cloudy he will get Charnier. He reloads his gun and runs into another room. A single gunshot is heard. Title cards describe various characters' fates: Weinstock was indicted, but his case was dismissed for "lack of proper evidence"; Angie Boca received a suspended sentence for a misdemeanor; Lou Boca received a reduced sentence for conspiracy and possession of narcotics; Devereaux served four years in a federal penitentiary for conspiracy; Charnier was never caught and is believed to be living in France. Popeye and Cloudy were transferred out of the Narcotics Bureau and reassigned.

Four real-estate salesmen (Richard Roma, George Aaronow, Shelley "The Machine" Levene, and Dave Moss) are supplied with leads—the names and phone numbers of prospective investors—and use deceitful and dubious sales tactics. Many of the leads rationed by office manager John Williamson lack either the money or the desire to actually invest in land. The firm sends Blake, one of its top salesmen, to motivate the team. In a torrent of verbal abuse, he gives them notice of termination and tells them that only the top two deal-closers of the month, with one week to go, will keep their jobs and gain access to promising leads for the new and lucrative Glengarry Highlands development. Levene is a once-successful salesman in a long-running slump and with a daughter in the hospital. Levene tries to persuade Williamson to give him some of the Glengarry leads. Williamson is willing to sell some of the prime leads, but demands cash in advance, which Levene does not have. Moss and Aaronow complain about the firm's management, and Moss proposes that they steal the Glengarry leads and sell them to a competing agency. Aaronow wants no part of the plan, but Moss tries to coerce him, saying that Aaronow is already an accessory before the fact because he knows about the proposed burglary. Roma, the office's top closer, manipulates a meek, middle-aged man named James Lingk into buying property. Framing the deal as an opportunity rather than a purchase, Roma plays on Lingk's feelings of insecurity. The next day, when the salesmen arrive at the office, they learn that there has been a burglary and that the Glengarry leads have been stolen. Williamson assures Roma that his contract with Lingk was not stolen, and he and the police question each of the salesmen in private. After his interrogation, Moss has a shouting match with Roma and leaves. Lingk arrives to demand the return of his down payment under the three-day cooling-off period because his wife objects to the deal. Roma tries to stall and confuse Lingk but is interrupted by the police detective, who wants to question him. He lies to Lingk, telling him that the check has not yet been cashed and that there is time to cancel the payment when he returns from a trip on Monday. Williamson, who is unaware of the tactic, contradicts him, causing Lingk to rush out of the office upset. Roma berates Williamson for ruining his sale, unaware that Williamson also lied to him and the check was not cashed. Levene, proud of a big sale that he made that morning, also berates Williamson for "making something up" without knowing the situation. Williamson realizes that Levene could only have known he lied about the check being cashed if he broke into the office and saw the check on his desk (as he, in practice, always takes the checks immediately to the bank at the end of the night), and threatens to inform the police if he does not return the leads. Levene admits that he sold the leads to a competitor and split the money with Moss. Levene attempts to bribe Williamson with a share of his sales to keep quiet, but Williamson scoffs that Levene has no sales. He already knows Levene's latest buyers are a delusional couple who have no money. Levene realizes he has been set up to fail by being given a worthless lead, and asks Williamson why, to which Williamson replies "because I don't like you." Levene pleads for his ill daughter, but Williamson rebuffs him and leaves to inform the detective. Roma emerges from questioning. Unaware of the exchange, he compliments Levene on his sale and suggests that they form their own partnership. As Levene gets up to meet with the detective, he looks back wistfully at Roma, who has already returned to his sales work. Aaronow picks up the phone and calls a lead.

While driving through Alabama, New York college students Bill Gambini and Stan Rothenstein stop at a convenience store, where Bill absentmindedly pockets a can of tuna. After they leave, the store clerk is found robbed and murdered, and the boys are pulled over and arrested. At the police station, Bill assumes he has been caught shoplifting and confesses, leading to his being charged with murder and Stan as an accessory. Unable to afford a private attorney, Bill calls on his cousin, Vinny Gambini, a personal injury lawyer from Brooklyn, who agrees to take the case. Unbeknownst to them, Vinny has only just passed the bar after numerous failed attempts and has no trial experience. He travels to Alabama with his fiancée, Mona Lisa Vito. Vinny convinces the trial judge, Chamberlain Haller, that he is an experienced New York attorney practicing under the alias "Jerry Gallo" (later, "Jerry Callo"). Haller, however, repeatedly finds him in contempt for his attire, attitude, and lack of courtroom decorum, leading to several brief jail sentences. The prosecuting district attorney, Jim Trotter III, presents a strong but circumstantial case, calling multiple witnesses who implicate Bill and Stan in the murder. Vinny declines to cross-examine these witnesses during the preliminary hearing, alarming the defendants. Stan subsequently fires Vinny and retains the public defender, John Gibbons. Vinny's inexperience leads him to attempt tricking Trotter into sharing evidence, until Lisa informs him that he can legally obtain it through discovery. She also encourages him to begin interviewing the witnesses, which he proceeds to do. Lisa grows frustrated with Vinny, reminding him of his promise to marry her once he wins his first case, and fearing that day may never come. At the same time, Vinny is eager to prove himself to his mentor, Judge Malloy, who persuaded him to pursue a career in law. During the trial, Gibbons's nervousness and severe stutter undermine Stan's defense. Meanwhile, Vinny adopts an aggressive but perceptive questioning style that steadily discredits Trotter's witnesses. He uses his newfound knowledge of the cooking time of grits to show that one witness's timeline of the crime is inaccurate. He then challenges the others by questioning their ability to positively identify the suspects due to obstructions in their sightline and impaired vision. Impressed, Stan rehires Vinny to represent him. The next day, Trotter calls a surprise witness, FBI analyst George Wilbur. Wilbur testifies that tire tracks at the crime scene match those of the boys' 1964 Buick Skylark, though Vinny gets him to admit the tires are among the most common in the United States. Haller then orders a lunch recess and denies Vinny's request for a full-day continuance to prepare a rebuttal. Exhausted from lack of sleep, strained by Haller's hostility, and fearing he will lose the case, Vinny lashes out at Lisa when she tries to help. Soon after, however, he realizes that one of her photographs, showing the tire marks at the scene, may help the case. Vinny compels a reluctant Lisa to testify as an expert witness, drawing on her family background in auto repair and her encyclopedic knowledge of cars. Examining the photograph, Lisa explains that only the 1963 Pontiac Tempest, which resembles a Buick Skylark, could have made the tire tracks, due to its independent rear suspension and Positraction. Vinny recalls Wilbur to the stand, who confirms Lisa's testimony, simultaneously discrediting his own. The sheriff then testifies that, at Vinny's request, he identified two men fitting Bill's and Stan's description who were arrested in Georgia while driving a stolen Pontiac Tempest, and were carrying a gun matching the murder weapon. With the prosecution's case dismantled, Trotter moves to have all charges dismissed. Bill, Stan, the sheriff, Trotter, and Judge Haller congratulate Vinny on his success. As he and Lisa drive away, she reveals that she persuaded Judge Malloy to vouch for Vinny's fictitious "Jerry Callo" résumé. The couple then resumes bickering over their long-delayed wedding plans.

David Gale is a former professor on death row in Texas. With only a few days until his execution, his lawyer negotiates a half-million-dollar fee to tell his story to Bitsey Bloom, a journalist from a major news network. She has a reputation for keeping secrets and protecting her sources. He tells her his story, revealed through a series of flashbacks. In 1994, Gale is a successful intellectual and the head of the philosophy department at the fictional University of Austin (not to be confused with the present day and then non-existent University of Austin). He is an active member of DeathWatch, an advocacy group campaigning against capital punishment. At a graduation party, he encounters Berlin, a graduate student who has been expelled from the school. When Gale gets drunk, she seduces him, and they have rough sex. She then falsely accuses Gale of rape. The next day, he loses a televised debate with the Governor of Texas when he is unable to name any innocent people executed during the governor's term. Gale is arrested, but the charge is dropped when Berlin disappears. However, his marriage, career, and reputation are all destroyed. Gale struggles with alcoholism after his wife Sharon takes their son with her to Spain and disallows contact. Constance Harraway, a fellow DeathWatch activist, is a close friend of Gale who consoles him after his life falls apart. However, Harraway is discovered raped and murdered, suffocated by a plastic bag taped over her head. An autopsy reveals Gale's semen in her body and that she had been forced to swallow the key to the handcuffs, a Securitate torture technique which Gale previously wrote about. The physical evidence at the crime scene points to Gale, who is convicted of rape and murder and is sentenced to death. In the present, Bloom investigates the case between her visits with Gale. Gale maintains his innocence, claiming he and Harraway had consensual sex the night before her murder. Bloom comes to believe that the apparent evidence against Gale does not add up. She is tailed several times in her car by Dusty Wright, an alleged one-time lover and colleague of Harraway, whom she suspects was the real killer. Wright slips evidence to Bloom that suggests Gale has been framed, implying that the actual murderer videotaped the crime. Bloom pursues this lead until she finds a tape revealing that Harraway, who was suffering from terminal leukemia, had committed an elaborate suicide made to look like murder. Wright is seen on the videotape, acting as her accomplice, implying that they framed Gale as part of a plan to discredit the death penalty by conspiring to execute an innocent person, and subsequently releasing evidence of the actual circumstances. Once Bloom and her aide find this evidence, only hours remain until Gale's scheduled execution. She tries to give the tape to the authorities in time to stop the execution. She arrives at the Huntsville Unit just as the warden announces that the execution has been carried out. The tape is subsequently released, causing an uproar over the execution of an innocent man. Later, Wright receives the money that Bloom's magazine agreed to pay for the interview and delivers it to Sharon, along with a postcard from Berlin confessing that the rape accusation that derailed Gale's life and career was false. Sharon looks distraught, knowing Gale told the truth and that she effectively stole their child away from him. Later, a videotape labeled "Off the Record" is delivered to Bloom. This tape shows Harraway's suicide and Gale deliberately leaving his fingerprints on the plastic bag in the process. He then looks at the camera and ends the recording, leaving Bloom stunned with the truth that the couple deliberately sacrificed themselves to discredit capital punishment.

In a dilapidated apartment building in post-apocalyptic France, food is in short supply and grain is used as currency. On the ground floor is a butcher 's shop, run by the landlord, Clapet, who posts job opportunities in the newspaper to lure victims to the building, whom he murders and butchers as a cheap source of meat to sell to his tenants. Following the murder of the last worker, unemployed circus clown Louison applies for the vacant position. Louison proves to be a superb worker with a spectacular trick knife, and the butcher is reluctant to kill him too quickly. During Louison's routine maintenance, he acquires a package dropped by a mailman. Louison delivers the package to Clapet's daughter, Julie, who says the package contains confections and invites him to join her that evening. Louison and Julie's relationship blossoms into romance. At the same time, several of the tenants fall under Louison's boyish charms, worrying others who are more anxious for their own safety should they require meat. Clapet tells apartment tenant Marcel Tapioca that his rent is late and he must give up his mother-in-law as payment. That evening, Julie begs her father to let Louison go, knowing that Clapet is killing tenants for meat. She goes to her apartment, unwraps a newspaper in her refrigerator and sees an article about the Troglodytes, a group of vegetarian rebels who live underground. Julie descends into the sewers to make contact with the feared Troglodytes, whom she persuades to help rescue Louison. Following the apparent butchering of Tapioca's mother-in-law, the Troglodistes go through the sewer pipes and attempt to capture Louison, but end up mistakenly capturing tenant Mademoiselle Plusse instead. Meanwhile, as Julie and Louison watch television, Clapet ascends to the roof, shaking the television antenna to lure Louison into going up to fix it. Attacking Louison with a cleaver, Clapet's attempt to kill him is foiled by an unexpected electrical explosion in one of the apartments. Clapet, along with some tenants, storms Louison's room in another attempt to murder him. Louison and Julie take refuge in a bathroom and flood it, floor to ceiling, until Clapet opens the door, releasing the flood and washing the attackers away. Mademoiselle Plusse escapes the sewers, finds Louison's boomerang knife, and gives it to Clapet. Clapet throws the knife towards Louison, but inadvertently kills himself. Louison and Julie play music together on the roof of the now peaceful apartment building, and the butcher's shop closed for good.

William Foster is stuck in Los Angeles traffic on a hot day. After his air conditioning fails, he abandons his car and begins walking, carrying his briefcase. At a convenience store, the Korean owner refuses to give change for a telephone call. Foster becomes agitated over the high prices. The owner grabs a baseball bat and demands that Foster leave. Foster takes the bat and destroys several merchandise displays before paying for a drink and leaving. Later, while resting on a hill, he is harassed by two Mexican gang members, who threaten him with a knife and demand his briefcase. Foster attacks them with the bat and takes their knife. The gang members, now in a car with two associates, find Foster using a payphone. They open fire, killing four bystanders, but not Foster. The driver crashes. Foster picks up a weapon they had, shoots the surviving gang member in the leg, and then leaves with their bag of weapons. Foster encounters a panhandler who harasses him for change. Foster gives him the briefcase, which only contains his lunch. At a fast-food restaurant, Foster attempts to order breakfast, but is told they have switched to the lunch menu. After an argument with the manager, Foster pulls a gun and fires into the ceiling accidentally. After trying to reassure the frightened employees and customers, he orders lunch, but is annoyed when the burger looks nothing like the one pictured. He leaves and tries to place a call from a phone booth, then shoots the booth to pieces after being hassled by someone who was waiting to use the phone. After Foster calls "home" again and states his intention to attend his daughter's birthday party, his ex-wife Beth notifies the police as she has a restraining order against him. Sergeant Martin Prendergast, who is on his last day of duty (having been coaxed into retirement by his wife), insists on investigating the events. Interviews with witnesses lead Prendergast to suspect that the same person is responsible for all of them. Foster's vanity license plate, which read "D-FENS", proves to be an important lead, because Prendergast remembers being in the same traffic jam as Foster. Prendergast and his partner, Detective Sandra Torres, visit Foster's mother, who is surprised to learn that he lost his job. They realize Foster is heading toward his former family's home in Venice and rush to intercept him. Foster passes a bank where a black man is protesting after being rejected for a loan. The man exchanges a glance with Foster and says, "Don't forget me," as police escort him away. Foster stops at a military surplus store to buy boots. The owner, a homophobic Neo-Nazi, diverts Torres when she comes in. After Torres leaves, the owner offers Foster a rocket launcher and congratulates him for the restaurant shooting incident. When Foster expresses distaste for the store owner's bigotry, the man becomes violent and attempts to turn him over to the police, but Foster stabs him then shoots him dead. Foster changes into tactical clothes, takes the rocket launcher, and leaves. Foster encounters a road repair crew who are not working and accuses them of doing unnecessary repairs to justify their budget. He pulls out the rocket launcher but struggles to use it, until a boy explains how it works. Foster accidentally fires the launcher, blowing up the construction site. By the time Foster reaches Beth's house, she has already fled with their daughter. He realizes that they may have gone to the nearby Venice Pier, but Prendergast and Torres arrive before he can pursue them. Foster shoots Torres, injuring her, and flees with Prendergast in pursuit. At the pier, Foster confronts his ex-wife and daughter. Adele is happy to see him, but Beth wants him to leave. Prendergast arrives and distracts Foster long enough for Beth to throw his gun into the ocean. Prendergast aims his gun at Foster and urges him to surrender, acknowledging his complaints about social inequalities but not accepting them as an excuse for his rampage. With nothing left for him, Foster tricks Prendergast into killing him. Having asserted himself, Prendergast decides to hold off retirement.

Griffin Mill is a Hollywood studio executive dating story editor Bonnie Sherow. He hears story pitches from screenwriters and decides which have the potential to be made into films, green-lighting only twelve out of 50,000 submissions every year. His job is threatened when up-and-coming exec Larry Levy begins working at the studio. Mill has also been receiving death threat postcards, assumed to be from a screenwriter whose pitch he rejected. Mill surmises that the disgruntled writer is David Kahane, and Kahane's girlfriend June Gudmundsdottir tells him that Kahane is at the Rialto Theater in South Pasadena, at a screening of The Bicycle Thief. Mill pretends to recognize Kahane in the lobby and offers him a scriptwriting deal, hoping this will stop the threats. The two go to a nearby bar where Kahane gets intoxicated and rebuffs Mill's offer, calling him a liar and continuing to goad him about his job security at the studio. In the bar's parking lot, the two men fight. Mill goes too far and drowns Kahane in a shallow pool of water while screaming, "Keep it to yourself!" Mill then stages the crime to make it look like a botched robbery. The next day, after Mill is late for and distracted at a meeting, studio security chief Walter Stuckel confronts him about the murder and says that the police know that he was the last one to see Kahane alive. At the end of their conversation Mill receives a fax from his stalker. Thus, Mill has killed the wrong man, and the stalker apparently knows this. Mill attends Kahane's funeral and gets into conversation with Gudmundsdottir. Detectives Avery and DeLongpre suspect Mill is guilty of murder. Mill receives a postcard from the stalker suggesting that they meet at a hotel bar. While Mill is waiting, he is cornered by two screenwriters, Tom Oakley and Andy Sivella, who pitch Habeas Corpus, a legal drama featuring no major stars and with a depressing ending. Because Mill is not alone, his stalker does not appear. After leaving the bar, Mill receives a fax in his car, advising him to look under his raincoat. He discovers a live rattlesnake in a box and, terrified, bludgeons it with his umbrella. Mill tells Gudmundsdottir that his near-death experience made him realize he has feelings for her. Apprehensive that Levy continues encroaching on his job, Mill invites the two writers to pitch Habeas Corpus to him, convincing Levy that the movie will be an Oscar contender. Mill's plan is to let Levy shepherd the film through production and have it flop. Mill will step in at the last moment, suggesting some changes to salvage the film's box office, letting him reclaim his position at the studio. Having persuaded Sherow to leave for New York on studio business, Mill takes Gudmundsdottir to a Hollywood awards banquet and their relationship blossoms. After Sherow confronts Mill about his relationship with Gudmundsdottir, Mill coldly severs their relationship in front of two writers. Mill takes Gudmundsdottir to an isolated Desert Hot Springs resort and spa. In the middle of Mill and Gudmundsdottir making love, Mill confesses his role in Kahane's murder, and Gudmundsdottir responds by saying she loves him. Mill's attorney informs him that studio head Joel Levison has been fired, and that the Pasadena police want Mill to participate in a lineup. An eyewitness has come forward, but she fails to identify Mill. One year later, studio power players are watching the end of Habeas Corpus with a new, tacked-on, upbeat ending and famous actors in the lead roles. Mill's plan to save the movie has worked and he is head of the studio. Gudmundsdottir is now Mill's wife and pregnant with his child. Sherow objects to the film's new ending and is fired by Levy. Mill rebuffs her when she appeals her termination to him. Mill receives a pitch over the phone from Levy and a man who reveals himself as the postcard writer. The man pitches an idea about a studio executive who kills a writer and gets away with murder. Recognizing the pitch as blackmail, Mill gives the writer a deal, if he can guarantee an ending in which the executive lives happily with the writer's widow. The writer's title for the film is The Player.

Ghost Dog sees himself as a retainer of Louie, a local mobster, who saved Ghost Dog's life years earlier. While living as a hitman for the American Mafia, he adheres to the code of the samurai, and interprets and applies the wisdom of the Hagakure. Louie tells Ghost Dog to kill a gangster, Handsome Frank, who is sleeping with the daughter of local mafia boss Vargo. Ghost Dog arrives and kills the gangster, before seeing that the girl is also in the room; he leaves her alive, and she gives him a copy of the book Rashōmon to read. To avoid being implicated in the murder of a made man, Vargo and his associate Sonny Valerio decide to get rid of Ghost Dog. Louie knows practically nothing about Ghost Dog, as the hitman communicates only by homing pigeon. The mobsters start by tracing all the pigeon coops in town. They find Ghost Dog's cabin atop a building and kill his pigeons. Ghost Dog realizes he must kill Vargo and his men or they will kill him and his master. During the day, Ghost Dog frequently visits the park to see his best friend, a French-speaking ice cream man named Raymond. Ghost Dog does not understand French and Raymond does not understand English but the two nonetheless seem to connect with each other. Ghost Dog also befriends a little girl named Pearline, to whom he lends the book Rashōmon. Eventually, Ghost Dog invades Vargo's mansion and kills almost everyone single-handedly, sparing only Louie and Vargo's daughter. That night, Ghost Dog kills Sonny Valerio at his home by shooting him through a pipe. Ghost Dog expects that Louie will attack him, as he feels that Louie is obliged to avenge the murder of his boss Vargo. He goes to the park and gives Raymond all his money, helping him to stay in the country. Pearline appears and gives back Rashōmon to Ghost Dog, saying that she liked it. Ghost Dog gives Pearline his copy of Hagakure and encourages her to read it. Though Louie feels some loyalty to Ghost Dog, he finally confronts him at Raymond's ice cream stand with Raymond and Pearline watching. Ghost Dog is unwilling to attack his master and allows Louie to kill him. His last act is to give Louie the copy of Rashōmon and encourage him to read it. Pearline takes Ghost Dog's empty gun and aims at Louie as he flees. Ghost Dog dies from his wounds, lying on the asphalt. Raymond weeps while Pearline watches Louie leave; Louie gets into a car with Vargo's daughter (who now has replaced her father as his boss). Later, Pearline reads the Hagakure.

In 1949 Santa Rosa, California, Ed Crane is a quiet barber working in his brother-in-law Frank’s barbershop. His wife Doris, a bookkeeper, struggles with a drinking problem, and their marriage is strained. One day, a customer named Creighton Tolliver tells Ed about an investment opportunity in a new technology called dry cleaning. Tolliver persuades Ed to invest $10,000, but Ed, desperate for money, decides to blackmail Doris's boss, "Big Dave" Brewster, whom he suspects of having an affair with her. Ed anonymously demands money from Brewster, who embezzles funds from his department store to meet the blackmail demands. However, Brewster soon uncovers the scheme and confronts Ed. After Tolliver implicates Ed in the plan, Brewster beats him to death. In a desperate attempt to protect himself, Ed fatally stabs Brewster with a cigar knife in self-defense. Despite this, the police discover discrepancies in the store’s financial records and arrest Doris, suspecting her of both embezzling the money and murdering Brewster. Ed hires Freddy Riedenschneider, a Sacramento defense attorney, who arrives in town and immediately starts living lavishly on the defense fund Doris’s family raised by mortgaging the barbershop. On the day of Doris’s trial, she is found dead, having hanged herself in her jail cell. It is later revealed that Doris was pregnant when she died, though she and Ed had not been intimate for years. Ed’s world unravels further as Frank, now deeply in debt and consumed by grief, turns to alcohol. Amid the chaos, Ed begins spending time with Rachel "Birdy" Abundas, a teenage girl and friend of the family, listening to her play the piano. Ed fantasizes about launching her musical career and becoming her manager, but his dreams are crushed when a music teacher bluntly informs him that Birdy has no talent. On the way home, Birdy makes an overt sexual advance toward Ed, causing him to lose control of his car and crash. Ed wakes up in the hospital to find himself arrested for murder. Tolliver’s body, beaten and found with Ed’s investment contract, leads the police to believe that Ed coerced Doris into embezzling the money and murdered Tolliver when he discovered the scheme. With no resources left, Ed mortgages his house to hire Riedenschneider for his defense. However, during Riedenschneider’s opening statement, Frank attacks Ed in a fit of rage, and the judge declares a mistrial. With his defense in shambles, Ed throws himself at the mercy of the court, but the judge sentences him to death. While awaiting execution on death row, Ed writes his life story to sell to a pulp magazine. One night, he sees a UFO outside the prison, which he walks away from. As Ed is led to the electric chair, he reflects on his life and decisions, finding peace with his past. He regrets nothing and holds hope that, in the afterlife, he and Doris will be free from the imperfections of the mortal world.

Three young men arrive at a borstal by prison van: Carlin, who has taken the blame for his brother's theft of scrap metal; Angel for stealing a car; and Davis for escaping from an open institution. Each is allocated a room; Angel and Davis get single rooms, while Carlin is sent to a dormitory. Carlin, having been transferred for assaulting a warden, wants to keep a low profile. He meets and befriends Archer, an eccentric and intellectual inmate serving two years for workplace fraud who is intent upon peacefully inconveniencing the staff as much as possible through nonviolent resistance. Archer tells Carlin how his reputation is already known: Banks, the current "Daddy" (the inmate who controls the wing), is seeking Carlin for a fight to maintain his dominance over the wing. Banks's status appears to have been achieved by petty bullying and intimidation with the aid of his henchmen Richards and Eckersley and the passive assent of the staff. Carlin struggles to settle into the dormitory and, after witnessing the timid and vulnerable Davis hazed and attacked by Banks, is himself viciously beaten and headbutted by Banks in an unprovoked attack. Angel is brutally beaten up by Banks and Richards in his room. Davis is framed for theft of a radio by Eckersley and placed on report. Soon sentenced to arrest, the three newcomers find themselves in solitary confinement. Realising there is no hope of being allowed to serve his term as a borstal trainee in peace, Carlin exacts revenge and establishes dominance. Walking through the association (rec) room, he picks up two snooker balls and puts them in a sock. Using this improvised cosh on Richards, Carlin orders Eckersley to desist from informing, then goes to find Banks. Surprising him in a washroom he gives Banks a severe beating and then tells him who the "Daddy" of the wing now is: one who will 'kill him' if Banks ever interferes with his wellbeing. This ambush required cooperation and information from other inmates, showing how Carlin has soon won both respect and amity. Several days later, Carlin is challenged by an adjacent wing's Daddy whom he viciously beats but allows to continue to manage his wing under Carlin's overall control. Things improve for the inmates under Carlin, with victimisation of younger, weaker prisoners prevented, along with racially motivated violence. He keeps to the same seat at table in the dining hall, to where information and requests are directed, and with his associates such as Archer, Betts, Rhodes and Meakin – a contrast to Banks and his bullies. Carlin's status is recognised by the warders: he requests and gets a single cell in return for agreeing to be a responsible "natural leader" to the housemaster Mr Goodyear. Meanwhile, Meakin's friend Toyne learns through a letter from his in-laws that his wife has died. He becomes severely depressed, his despair being noticed by the warders, who scold him for "moping". Toyne slashes the arteries in his arms. He is transferred to an adult prison where, Meakin is informed by Dougan that he died after a second suicide attempt. Meakin is outraged by this and berates the staff for their negligence before storming out of the meeting. Dougan and Meakin are sent to solitary confinement whilst Carlin is instructed by Mr. Goodyear to keep the inmates under control, but while working alone in a greenhouse, Davis is gang-raped by three opportunistic youths who had requested a smoking break. Their supervising warder Sands sees what happens but reacts with a grin and then ignores the dishevelled state of the semi-undressed trio as they return. That night, a distraught Davis kills himself with a razor blade. While bleeding to death, he presses the button in his cell for help, but is ignored by warden Greaves. Davis's suicide is the last straw for the Borstal inmates. In the dining hall, having collected their food, the inmates sit silently, refusing to eat. Carlin initiates a full-scale riot in the dinner hall. Carlin, Archer and Meakin are later shown being dragged, bleeding and unconscious, into solitary confinement after having been beaten by the wardens. The Borstal's Governor later informs them the damage to the dinner hall will be repaid through lost earnings. The Governor then declares a minute's silent prayer for Davis.

Humbert Humbert, a middle-aged European professor of French literature, arrives in Ramsdale, New Hampshire, searching for summer accommodation before his professorship begins at Beardsley College, Ohio. Charlotte Haze, a sexually frustrated widow, offers him a room to rent at her house. Initially uninterested, Humbert changes his mind when he sees Charlotte's young daughter Dolores, nicknamed "Lolita", and is immediately smitten with her. Wanting Humbert's time for herself, Charlotte sends Dolores to an all-girl summer camp. After the Hazes depart for camp, the maid gives Humbert a love confession letter from Charlotte demanding that he vacate immediately, unless he reciprocates and marries her. Despite laughing while reading the letter, Humbert stays and marries Charlotte. In Lolita's absence, Humbert becomes withdrawn, and Charlotte grows unfulfilled and upset. She discovers Humbert's diary detailing his passion for Dolores and his contempt for Charlotte. Distraught, she runs outside, is hit by a car and dies. Humbert is visited by Charlotte's friends, who mistake his apathy with suicidal ideation and reveal that she had little time left anyway, since nephritis affected her single kidney. Humbert picks up Dolores from camp, telling her that Charlotte is sick in a hospital. They stay overnight in a hotel hosting police convention attendees, and attract the attention of another guest. While Dolores sleeps upstairs, this stranger insinuates himself upon Humbert, presenting himself as a policeman and cryptically steering the conversation to Humbert and Dolores. The next morning, Dolores suggests to Humbert that they play a "game" she learned at camp, and it is implied that they have sex. Humbert later confesses to Dolores that her mother is dead. Grief-stricken, she stays with Humbert. The two commence a trip cross country, acting publicly as father and daughter. In the fall, Humbert initiates his position at Beardsley College and enrolls Dolores in high school there. A jealous Humbert worries about her involvement with male classmates and the lead she has been offered in the school play, and people grow curious about his protectiveness. One night, he returns home to find a stranger in his darkened living room. Claiming to be Dr. Zempf, the psychologist from Dolores's school, he inquires about her knowledge of " the facts of life " and coerces Humbert into allowing her to participate in the school play. During a performance of the play, Humbert learns that Dolores has been lying about spending Saturday afternoons at piano practice. They have an argument and Humbert decides to take Dolores on the road again. Dolores objects at first, but seemingly changes her mind after making a surreptitious phone call. Once on the road, Humbert realizes that they are being followed by a car. Dolores falls ill and he takes her to the hospital. One night, a mysterious call to his motel room prompts Humbert to visit the hospital in order to discharge Dolores, but he is told that she already left with a man claiming to be her uncle. Humbert is devastated. Three years later, he receives a letter from Dolores, now pregnant, married to an unemployed and half-deaf mechanic, and in need of money. Humbert visits her and asks who had kidnapped her from the hospital. She says that it was Clare Quilty, a famous playwright and the intrusive stranger who kept crossing their path all along, disguising himself as a policeman and later Dr. Zempf. Dolores was infatuated with Quilty ever since his fling with Charlotte years ago, and carried on an affair with him at Beardsley. She left the hospital with him when he promised her a Hollywood contract. Instead, he secluded her in a dude ranch near Santa Fe and demanded that she join his depraved lifestyle and act in his child pornography, which she refused. Humbert begs Dolores to leave with him. She refuses, on account of her new predicament, but apologizes for cheating. Humbert gives Dolores $13,000, her money from the sale of Charlotte's house. He then leaves to confront Quilty in his mansion at gunpoint. A drunk Quilty tries to dodge the situation with bizarre offers (including an invitation to attend executions), but is shot dead by Humbert. A postscript reveals that Humbert later died of coronary thrombosis awaiting trial for Quilty's murder.