Lucas is a member of a close-knit rural Danish community and works at a local kindergarten, where he gets along well with the children. He misses his teenage son, Marcus, who lives with his ex-wife after their recent divorce. However, Lucas' fortune seems to take a turn after Marcus states he would prefer to live with his father and Lucas starts dating Nadja, a co-worker at the kindergarten. Klara, the daughter of Lucas' best friend Theo and a pupil at the kindergarten, has a tendency to wander off on her own when her parents argue; Lucas occasionally happens upon her when she is alone and helps her out. He accommodates her aversion to stepping on cracks and says she can walk his dog, Fanny, whenever she wants. Over time, Klara develops a crush on Lucas; when she kisses him on the mouth and gives him a small gift, he gently rebuffs her, leaving her dejected. Using details from a pornographic picture shown to her by her older brother's friend, Klara makes comments that lead Grethe, the director of the kindergarten, to believe Lucas indecently exposed himself to her. Grethe informs Lucas of the allegation but is unable to tell him of the details; she then invites an acquaintance to interview Klara, and after she nods in response to the man's leading questions, Grethe, who does not believe that children lie about such things, alerts the authorities and informs the parents of the children who attend the kindergarten. Klara later contradicts her initial story, but the adults see this as stemming from denial of her ordeal. Lucas subsequently loses his job, his friendship with Theo, and is shunned by the community. Due to the vague language used and the secrecy around the investigation, he does not know specifically what he is accused of, but eventually hears he may have been accused of abusing multiple children. The strain of this revelation leads him to end his relationship with Nadja, as Lucas believes she doubts his innocence. Marcus runs away from his mother to be with Lucas. After a trip to the grocery store, where he is told that neither he nor his father are welcome, he sees Lucas being arrested by the police. Locked out of the house, Marcus goes to ask Theo for a spare key but ends up fighting with several adults for confronting Klara, having asked why she lied about his father. He is taken in by Bruun, one of Lucas' friends who believes him to be innocent. Bruun tells Marcus that Lucas has a hearing in the morning and he is hopeful the case against him will be dropped, since he has heard that the fabricated accounts of many children mention a "basement" in Lucas' house, which does not have one. Lucas is released from custody and reunites with Marcus. An unseen man murders Lucas' dog, Fanny, and throws a large stone through his window. Lucas sends Marcus back to his ex-wife for his safety and buries his dog. While shopping for groceries on Christmas Eve, the staff assault Lucas and throw him out; however, the latter returns and headbutts the butcher to get his groceries back. Theo and his wife notice Lucas limp out of the store, bleeding from his head. During a Christmas church service, Lucas attacks Theo in front of the congregation and challenges him to look in his eyes for a sign he is lying about his innocence; Theo had previously stated he "could always tell" if Lucas was lying. When Theo visits Klara in her bedroom that night, she admits that Lucas did not do anything bad to her. Theo then brings Lucas food and alcohol, as the two men sit together and talk. By the next fall, tensions in the community seem all but gone, Lucas's friends greet him as before, and he and Nadja have reconciled. Marcus receives his first rifle at a ceremony at Bruun's house. Afterwards, Lucas and Klara reunite and he carries her in his arms so she can avoid stepping on cracks. The adult men go hunting on the surrounding estate; when Lucas is by himself, a bullet barely misses him and hits a tree. He turns and watches as the shooter, silhouetted against the sun, reloads his rifle and points it at Lucas for a moment before fleeing. Lucas, shaken, stands in silence.

A kind, yet naïve, ethnography student named Shurik (Alexander Demyanenko), known from earlier films as a student at a polytechnic institute, goes to the Caucasus to learn ancient customs and traditions practised by the locals, including "myths, legends, and toasts". At the start of the film, Shurik is making his way along a mountain road in the Caucasus on a donkey. He comes upon a truck driver named Edik whose truck refuses to start. The donkey gets stubborn and neither man is able to get his respective mode of transportation going. Suddenly, a young woman named Nina (Natalya Varley) comes walking down the road. The donkey immediately begins to move after her and the truck starts working again. Nina is "a higher education student, an athlete, a member of the Komsomol, and last but not least — a beauty". Her uncle, Comrade Dzhabrail (Frunzik Mkrtchyan), works as a chauffeur for Comrade Saakhov (Vladimir Etush), who is the director of the regional agricultural cooperative and the wealthiest and most powerful man in town. Saakhov likes Nina and invites her to take part in a ribbon-cutting ceremony for a new civil registry. Shurik shows up to the ribbon-cutting completely drunk because the locals refused to tell him local toasts unless he drank to each of them. He ends up becoming disorderly and the militsiya carts him off. Meanwhile, Saakhov decides to marry Nina and strikes a deal with Dzhabrail to purchase the bride in return for 20 head of sheep and an imported Finnish Rosenlew refrigerator. Rather than asking for Nina's agreement (which her uncle realizes would be impossible to get), they decide to kidnap her instead. The trio of the Coward, the Fool, and the Pro, hired to do the job, find it difficult to get Nina alone because she has started to spend a lot of time with Shurik. At this point, Saakhov has the idea to unwittingly get Shurik in on it by telling him that the kidnapping of the bride is a local custom. Dzhabrail meets with Shurik in a restaurant and tells him this story, lying to him that Nina has already agreed to marry Saakhov and that she wants to be kidnapped in order to comply with tradition. Shurik is devastated, because he is in love with Nina, but thinking that this is what she wants, he agrees to help. Nina has gone camping and spends a night in a sleeping bag. Shurik bids her an emotional good-bye; misunderstanding him, she shrugs and also says good-bye. Shurik then zips her up in her sleeping bag and signals to the Coward, the Fool, and the Pro, who run over to grab the helpless Nina and transport her to Saakhov's dacha. Soon after, Shurik learns that the kidnapping was real and that the story about it being a custom was a lie. Shurik immediately runs to the militsiya, but Saakhov (who Shurik does not realize is involved) is waiting for him outside. Saakhov explains to Shurik that if he says anything, the militsiya will arrest him as a co-conspirator and suggests they go straight to the local prosecutor instead. Shurik agrees, but Saakhov tricks him by leading him to a house where there is a party going on and getting him to drink, then calling doctors from the local psychiatric clinic and having Shurik committed. Meanwhile, at Saakhov's dacha, the trio of kidnappers lock Nina in a room and try to cheer her up by bringing food and singing songs. Nina pretends to be interested, but then when the kidnappers are distracted, she tries to run away. She is stopped by her uncle and forced to return to her room, where she is locked up. Saakhov arrives with a bottle of wine and goes in to speak with Nina, but runs out moments later covered from head to toe in the wine. Deciding to give Nina some time to "think about it", Dzhabrail and Saakhov drive away from the dacha, leaving the trio of kidnappers in charge of Nina. At the hospital, Shurik finally realizes that Saakhov is the one behind the kidnapping. Shurik escapes from the psychiatric ward and happens to run into Edik, the truck driver he had met at the beginning of the film. Together, they drive toward Saakhov's dacha. When they arrive, they have changed into doctors' uniforms and convince the Coward, the Fool, and the Pro that they are doing emergency vaccinations against a dangerous hoof-and-mouth disease that is affecting the area. Under this guise, they inject the trio with sedatives. While Edik is performing the injections, Shurik goes up to Nina's room. Still thinking that he was in on the kidnapping, she hits him over the head with a fruit plate, runs out of the room, jumps out of a first-floor window, and steals one of the trucks. A car chase ensues in which the kidnappers chase Nina while Shurik and Edik chase the kidnappers. The kidnappers catch up with Nina, commandeer her vehicle, and tie her up, but at that moment the sedative begins to take effect and they all fall asleep. Shurik catches up with the truck right before it veers off the road and stops it. He begins to untie Nina, but she attacks him, still thinking that he is in league with the kidnappers. To reveal his feelings for her, Shurik kisses Nina before he finishes untying her. The action moves to Saakhov's apartment at night. He is alone. Suddenly, Nina, Shurik, and Edik appear, holding rifles, dressed in masks, and calling themselves the enforcers of the "law of the mountains". Saakhov does not recognize them and, scared to death, jumps out of the window. Edik shoots him with his shotgun, which turns out to be loaded with nothing more than salt. He hits him in the rump and, when Saakhov is brought up on charges in court the next day, he is unable to sit. The film ends with Shurik walking Nina to a bus and then following after her on his donkey.

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

In post-World War II Rome, Antonio Ricci desperately needs work to support his wife Maria, his son Bruno and his small baby. He is offered a job posting advertising bills but tells Maria he cannot accept because the job requires a bicycle. Maria resolutely strips the bed of her dowry bedsheets — prized possessions for a poor family — and takes them to the pawn shop, where they bring enough to redeem Antonio's bicycle. On his first day of work, Antonio is at the top of a ladder when a young man steals his bicycle. Antonio runs after him but is thrown off the trail by the thief's confederates. The police file Antonio's complaint but say that there is little they can do. Advised that stolen goods often surface at the Piazza Vittorio market, Antonio and his son go there with several friends. They find a bicycle frame that might be Antonio's, but the vendors refuse to allow them to examine the serial number. They call over a carabiniere, who orders the vendors to allow him to read the serial number. It does not match that of the missing bicycle, but the officer won't allow them to examine it for themselves. At the Porta Portese market, Antonio and Bruno spot someone he believes to be the thief with an old man. The thief eludes them and the old man feigns ignorance. They follow him into a church where he too slips away from them. Antonio pursues the thief into a brothel, whose denizens eject them. In the street, hostile neighbors gather as Antonio accuses the thief, who conveniently falls into a fit for which the crowd blames Antonio. Bruno fetches a policeman, who searches the thief's apartment without success. The policeman tells Antonio the case is weak — Antonio has no witnesses and the neighbors are certain to provide the thief with an alibi. Antonio and Bruno leave in despair amid jeers and threats from the crowd. Their way home takes them to the Stadio Nazionale PNF football stadium. Antonio sees an unattended bicycle near a doorway and after much anguished indecision, instructs Bruno to take the tram to a stop nearby and wait. Antonio circles the unattended bicycle and jumps on it. Instantly, the hue and cry is raised and Bruno—who has missed the tram—is stunned to see his father pursued, surrounded and pulled from the bicycle. As Antonio is being muscled toward the police station, the bicycle's owner notices Bruno in tears and, in a moment of compassion, tells the others to release Antonio. Antonio and Bruno then walk off slowly amid a buffeting crowd. Antonio fights back tears and Bruno takes his hand.

During the Vietnam War, a group of United States Marine Corps recruits arrive for eight weeks of Recruit Training at Parris Island, where Senior Drill Instructor Gunnery Sergeant Hartman uses harsh methods to train them for combat. Among the recruits are the wisecracking J. T. Davis, who is nicknamed "Joker" after mocking Hartman, and the overweight and dimwitted Leonard Lawrence, whom Hartman nicknames " Gomer Pyle ". During bootcamp, Pyle struggles to meet Hartman's expectations and is eventually paired with Joker. Pyle shows signs of improvement, but during an inspection, Hartman discovers a jelly doughnut in Pyle's footlocker. Believing the platoon has failed to improve Pyle, Hartman begins a policy of collective punishment in which he will punish everyone except for Pyle for each mistake he makes. In retaliation, the recruits haze Pyle with a blanket party, which Joker reluctantly participates in under pressure. Afterwards, Pyle appears to reinvent himself into a model recruit, showing particular expertise in marksmanship. This impresses Hartman but worries Joker, who believes Pyle may be suffering a mental breakdown after seeing Pyle talk to his rifle. The night before the new Marines are to leave Parris Island, Joker, on fire watch, discovers Pyle in the barracks latrine loading his M14 rifle with live ammunition, executing drill commands, and loudly reciting the Rifleman's Creed. Awakened by the commotion, Hartman orders Pyle to put down the rifle, but Pyle fatally shoots Hartman and then kills himself in front of Joker. By late January of 1968, Joker is a sergeant based in Da Nang for the newspaper Stars and Stripes alongside Private First Class "Rafter Man", a combat photographer. Their base is unsuccessfully raided as part of the Tet Offensive. The following morning, Joker and Rafter Man are sent to Phu Bai, where Joker searches for and reunites with Sergeant "Cowboy" Evans, a friend from Parris Island who now serves in a unit dubbed the "Lusthog Squad". During the Battle of Huế, platoon leader Lieutenant "'Mr. Touchdown'" Schinoski is killed, leading Sergeant "Crazy Earl" to take his place as squad leader. As they enter the city, the squad engages in combat with enemy forces and secure the area. Later, during a patrol, a booby-trapped rabbit toy kills Crazy Earl, leaving Cowboy in command. Becoming lost in the city, the squad is attacked by a Viet Cong sniper who fatally shoots "Eightball" and "Doc Jay". As the squad closes in on the sniper's location, Cowboy is killed. Assuming command, squad machine gunner "Animal Mother" leads an attack on the sniper. Joker locates her first, but his M16 rifle jams. The sniper, a teenage girl, overhears this and opens fire, while Rafter Man shoots and mortally wounds her. As the squad converges on the sniper, she begs for death, leading to an argument over whether to kill her or leave her to die in pain. Animal Mother agrees to a mercy killing but only if Joker will handle it; after some hesitation, Joker shoots her. As night falls, the Marines march to the Perfume River singing the " Mickey Mouse March ". A narration of Joker's thoughts conveys that, despite his being "in a world of shit", he is glad to be alive, and is "not afraid".

In September 1936, amid the Great Depression, grifter Johnny Hooker and his partners, Luther Coleman and Joe Erie, con $11,000 in cash from an unsuspecting victim in Joliet, Illinois. Hooker loses his share of the con on a rigged roulette game, while Luther, buoyed by the windfall, decides to retire. He tells Hooker to seek out his old friend, Henry Gondorff, in Chicago, to learn "the big con". Corrupt Joliet police lieutenant William Snyder confronts Hooker, revealing that their mark was a courier for vicious Irish-American crime boss Doyle Lonnegan. Lonnegan's men murder Luther and the courier. After finding Luther dead, Hooker flees to Chicago. Hooker finds Gondorff drunk and in hiding from the FBI, running a carousel that is a front for a brothel, and asks for help taking down Lonnegan. Initially reluctant, Gondorff relents and recruits a team of experienced con men. They decide to resurrect an elaborate, obsolete scam known as "the wire", using a large crew to create a phony off-track betting parlor. Snyder and Lonnegan's men track Hooker to Chicago; Gondorff warns Hooker that if either of them finds him, the con will have to be called off. Aboard the opulent 20th Century Limited, Gondorff, posing as the boorish Chicago bookie "Shaw", buys into Lonnegan's private, high-stakes poker game, being facilitated by the train's conductor. "Shaw" infuriates Lonnegan with his obnoxious behavior, then cheats him out of $15,000 ($ 348,022 in 2025). Hooker, posing as "Shaw's" disgruntled employee "Kelly", is sent to collect the winnings and convince Lonnegan to help him take over "Shaw's" operation – a tactic Lonnegan has used repeatedly to build his crime empire. Hooker returns home to find Lonnegan's men waiting to assassinate him, but he avoids their efforts. Their attempt spooks Gondorff, but Hooker convinces him to keep the con alive. Lonnegan, frustrated with his men's inability to kill Hooker for the Joliet con – and unaware that "Kelly" is Hooker – orders the job to be given to Salino, his best assassin. A mysterious figure, wearing black leather gloves, begins to follow and observe Hooker. Meanwhile, Snyder's pursuit of Hooker attracts the attention of undercover FBI agents led by Agent Polk, who orders Snyder to bring Hooker in to entrap Gondorff. "Kelly" gives Lonnegan a tip on a 7-to-1 long shot in a horse race that pays off. When Lonnegan presses him for details, he reveals that he has a partner, "Les Harmon" (actually con man Kid Twist), in the Chicago Western Union office, who will help them topple "Shaw" by winning bets he books on horse races through past-posting. Lonnegan is convinced after being provided the trifecta of another race, and agrees to finance a $500,000 bet ($ 11.6 million in 2025) to break "Shaw" and get revenge. Shortly thereafter, Snyder captures Hooker and brings him before Polk, who forces Hooker to betray Gondorff by threatening to jail Luther Coleman's widow. Feeling despondent the night before the sting, Hooker sleeps with a diner waitress named Loretta. The next morning, as she walks toward him in an alley, the black-gloved man appears and shoots her dead before she can shoot Hooker. The man reveals to Hooker that Gondorff hired him to protect him, and that the waitress was, in fact, Salino. After "Harmon" telephones directions to "Place it on Lucky Dan", Lonnegan bets $500,000 at "Shaw's" parlor on the horse named Lucky Dan to win. As the race begins, "Harmon" arrives and expresses shock at Lonnegan's bet: when he said "place it", he meant that the horse would "place" (i.e., finish second). In a panic, Lonnegan rushes to the teller window and demands his money back, at which point Polk, Snyder, and a half-dozen FBI agents storm the parlor. Polk tells Hooker he is free to go. Shocked at the betrayal, Gondorff shoots Hooker. Polk shoots Gondorff and orders Snyder to get the ostensibly respectable Lonnegan away from the crime scene. With Lonnegan and Snyder safely away, Hooker and Gondorff rise ("bleeding" only from fake bullets) amid cheers and laughter. "Polk" is actually Hickey, a fellow con man, who has been running a con atop Gondorff's con with his "FBI agents" to divert Snyder and ensure that Lonnegan abandoned the money without ever realizing he was taken. As the con men strip the room of its contents, Hooker refuses his share of the money, claiming he would lose it anyway, and walks away with Gondorff.

Selected at birth and legally adopted by a television studio following an unwanted pregnancy, Truman Burbank is the unsuspecting star of The Truman Show, a reality television program filmed and broadcast worldwide, 24/7, through hidden cameras. Truman's hometown, Seahaven Island, is set inside an enormous soundstage in Los Angeles, which allows Christof, the show's creator and executive producer, to control nearly all aspects of Truman's life. Truman's world is populated by actors and crew members who serve as his community while keeping him from discovering the truth. To prevent Truman from escaping, Christof has orchestrated various scenarios such as the "death" of Truman's father in a boating accident to instill thalassophobia, and has the cast reinforce Truman's anxieties with messages about the dangers of traveling and the virtues of staying home. Though the producers intend for Truman to fall in love with and marry a woman named Meryl, he develops feelings for an extra named Sylvia. Sympathetic to Truman's plight, Sylvia tries to tell him the truth, but is promptly fired and removed from the set. Truman marries Meryl, but their relationship is stilted and passionless, and he continues to dream of traveling to Fiji, where he was told Sylvia had moved, and living a happy life with her. In the real world, Sylvia joins "Free Truman", an activist group that calls for Truman's liberation from the show. As the show approaches its thirtieth anniversary, Truman notices unusual occurrences such as a stage light falling from the sky; an isolated patch of rain that falls only over him; a radio transmission describing his movements; and the reappearance of his father, who is rushed away by crew members before Truman can confront him. Inferring that the city somehow revolves around him, Truman questions his life and asks his closest confidants to help him solve the mystery. Truman's suspicions culminate in an attempt to escape the island, but increasingly implausible occurrences block his path. Eventually, he is caught and returned home under a flimsy pretext. There, he confronts Meryl and challenges the sincerity of their marriage. As he holds her at knifepoint, Meryl breaks character to call for help and is removed from the show. Hoping to bring Truman back to a controllable state, Christof reintroduces his father to the show under the guise of him having developed amnesia following the accident. The show regains its ratings, and Truman seems to return to his routines. One night, however, Christof discovers that Truman has begun sleeping in his basement. Disturbed by this change in behavior, Christof sends Truman's best friend Marlon to visit and discovers that Truman has disappeared through a makeshift tunnel. Christof suspends the broadcast for the first time in its history, leading to record viewing numbers. Truman is found sailing away from Seahaven, having conquered his fear of water. Christof resumes the transmission and, unable to fetch Truman by rescue boat, creates a violent storm in an attempt to capsize Truman's boat, ignoring the protests of the executive producers and his assistants. Truman nearly drowns but continues to sail until his boat strikes the wall of the soundstage. He finds a staircase leading to an exit door. As he contemplates leaving, Christof speaks to Truman, revealing the truth about the show and encouraging him to stay by claiming that there is no more truth in the real world than in his artificial one. Truman utters his catchphrase—"In case I don't see ya, good afternoon, good evening, and good night"—before bowing to the audience and exiting. Sylvia races to greet him as the executive producers end the program with a shot of the open exit door, leaving Christof devastated. Viewers around the world celebrate Truman's escape, before quickly becoming bored and switching to the other TV channels.

A 1959 Senate committee questions ex-AEC Chairman, Lewis Strauss, over his actions during Robert Oppenheimer's security hearing, when a revoked Q-clearance ended Oppenheimer's government advisory role. Strauss, who is nominated for Commerce Secretary, alleges the FBI was suspicious of Oppenheimer since his teaching days, well before anti-Communist William Borden accused him of espionage in 1954. He claims to not have acted against Oppenheimer, despite having many public disagreements with him. In the 1930s, Oppenheimer teaches at Caltech and Berkeley, after studying theoretical physics in Europe. Many Berkeley academics are also Communist Party members, but Oppenheimer does not join himself. After World War II breaks out, Ernst Lawrence of the Radiation Lab, cautions Oppenheimer against having communist connections. Oppenheimer scales back, and is approached by General Leslie Groves to lead the Manhattan Project. Oppenheimer proposes a new laboratory at Los Alamos, New Mexico, where they could endeavor to build an atomic bomb before the Nazis. Edward Teller is recruited to Los Alamos, and theorizes that an explosion would cause (global) atmospheric ignition. While his theory is disproved, he starts researching fusion-based weapons instead of working on the proposed fission bombs. After the War, Soviets test a plutonium bomb, similar to one developed at Los Alamos. In a meeting of top advisors, Oppenheimer frustrates Strauss by favoring arms talks with Russia instead of escalating with Teller's proposed thermonuclear weapons. During a heated period of discussion, Oppenheimer's past security lapses are brought up, including rekindling an affair with Communist ex-lover, Jean Tatlock, immediately after gaining his security clearance in 1942. Oppenheimer also protected his friend Haakon Chevalier from an espionage investigation, by directly lying to security officer, Boris Pash. In his later hearing by the Gray Board at the AEC, the board's counsel, Roger Robb, replays these accusations to make Oppenheimer seem guilty of disloyalty towards the US. In the present, Strauss alleges that Oppenheimer turned scientists against him, starting with Albert Einstein at Princeton in 1947. Teller testifies in Strauss' favor, and David Hill of the Chicago Met Lab is expected to do so too. In July 1945, the Trinity plutonium test is successful, and two bombs are subsequently dropped on Japan. Oppenheimer is labeled 'father of the atomic bomb', but his public stance in the post-war years changes towards nuclear non-proliferation. Irritated at constantly being undermined by Oppenheimer, AEC Chairman Strauss conspires with Borden to initiate the 1954 Gray Board hearing. He appoints Robb as the board's counsel, compromising its independence from the AEC. Oppenheimer's humiliation triggers scientists, who had attested to his loyalty and discretion. At Strauss' Senate hearing, Hill claims the scientific community is against him. Strauss loses the Commerce Secretary nomination and with it, his career. A flashback shows Oppenheimer did not mention Strauss to Einstein at all. Consumed by guilt over bringing atomic weapons to the world, he admits to Einstein that the global catastrophe they feared, and then believed was averted, was now ironically inevitable.

In the future, wealthy industrialists and business magnates and their top employees reign over the city of Metropolis from colossal skyscrapers, while underground-dwelling workers toil to operate the great machines that power it. Joh Fredersen is the city's master. His son, Freder, idles away his time at sports and in a pleasure garden, but is interrupted by the arrival of a young woman named Maria, who has brought a group of workers' children to witness the lifestyle of their rich "brothers". Maria and the children are ushered away, but Freder becomes fascinated by her. Against the strict rules of the city, he enters the lower levels to search for her. In the machine halls, he witnesses the explosion of a huge machine that kills and injures numerous workers. Freder has a hallucination that the machine is a temple of Moloch and the workers are being fed to it. When the hallucination ends, and he sees the dead workers being carried away on stretchers, he rushes to tell his father about the accident. Grot, foreman of the Heart Machine, brings Fredersen two maps found in the dead workers' pockets. Fredersen fires his assistant Josaphat for not being the first to bring him details about the explosion or the maps. After seeing his father's cold indifference towards the harsh conditions faced by the workers, Freder secretly rebels by deciding to help them. He enlists Josaphat's assistance and returns to the machine halls, taking the place of a worker who has collapsed from exhaustion. Fredersen takes the maps to the city's greatest inventor, Rotwang, to learn their meaning. Rotwang had been in love with a woman named Hel, who left him to marry Fredersen and later died giving birth to Freder. Rotwang shows Fredersen a robot he has built to " resurrect " Hel. The maps show a network of catacombs beneath Metropolis, and the two men go to investigate. They eavesdrop on a gathering of workers, including Freder. Maria addresses them, prophesying the arrival of a mediator who can bring the working and ruling classes together. Freder believes he can fill the role and declares his love for Maria. Fredersen orders Rotwang to give Maria's likeness to the robot so that it can discredit her among the workers, but is unaware of Rotwang's true plan to destroy Metropolis and kill Freder in revenge. Rotwang kidnaps Maria, fashions the robot in her image, and presents her to Fredersen. Freder finds the two embracing and, believing his father to have betrayed him, falls into a prolonged delirium. The false Maria dances sensuously at Rotwang's house and the Yoshiwara club, causing mayhem—the wealthy men do not recognize she is a machine. Intercut with Freder's hallucinations, the false Maria preaches to the workers that they must rise up against the surface world, resulting in chaos and dissent. Freder recovers and returns to the catacombs, accompanied by Josaphat. Finding the false Maria urging the workers to destroy the machines, he accuses her of not being the real Maria. The workers ignore him and carry out her wishes, smashing the machines and triggering a great flood in their underground city that threatens to drown their children. Fredersen and Rotwang struggle, and the real Maria, having escaped from Rotwang's house, rescues the children with help from Freder and Josaphat. Grot berates the celebrating workers for abandoning their children in the flood. The workers become hysterical and condemn the false Maria, burning her at the stake. A horrified Freder watches until the fire reveals her to be a robot. Rotwang, now suffering from a delusion that Maria is Hel, chases her to the roof of the cathedral, pursued by Freder. The two men fight as Fredersen and the workers watch from the street, and Rotwang falls to his death. Freder fulfills his destiny to unite the two halves of Metropolis' society by linking the hands of Fredersen and Grot to bring them together.

Bill is a man whose daily routines, perceptions, and dreams are illustrated through multiple split-screen windows that are narrated by an uncredited Don Hertzfeldt. He often has meetings with his ex-girlfriend, but suffers from an unnamed illness which interferes with his seemingly mundane and uneventful life. One day, he visits his doctor, who informs him that his illness is getting worse; as the days pass, Bill's hallucinations and thoughts worsen until he has a hallucinogenic mental breakdown and passes out in an alley. To help him recuperate, Bill's mother comes to take care of him, but Bill mistakenly believes she is about to kill him and attacks her. He is then taken to a hospital but his health fluctuates rapidly and confuses his doctor, who concludes that Bill will not die, which surprises and inconveniences his relatives. He returns to work the following day. In a flashback to Bill's childhood, the narrator explains the death of Bill's half-brother Randall, who ran into the sea while chasing a bird. After Randall's death, Bill's mother soon became fiercely protective of Bill and rarely left home, eventually causing his stepfather to leave. The narrator details the surreal history of Bill's family, many of whom suffered from mental illness and died in unpleasant ways. A few days after leaving the hospital, Bill receives a call telling him that his mother died in a "fit of senile hysterics". After the funeral, Bill finds a notebook where his mother practiced writing love notes to send to him when he was young. Bill again visits his doctor, who is shocked to find that nothing appears to be wrong with him. However, on his way to lunch, he suffers a seizure and collapses. During the seizure, various memories of his infancy and childhood flash before him. Bill returns to the hospital, where his ex-girlfriend frequently visits him. His new doctor questions him, revealing that Bill cannot remember basic information about his life. After a brain exam, Bill is asked various questions and shown photographs that appear irregular or nonsensical. His doctor explains that Bill is having trouble understanding the difference between past and present tense, and it is implied that many of his childhood memories and family history could have been confabulated. Bill is allowed to go home for family care, but he arrives home to find no one there. He starts to repeat and then forget various tasks, such as buying food and going for walks, and he does not seem to understand that he is ill. His doctor eventually explains that he does not have long to live. Bill's outlook undergoes a stark change, such as noticing more of life's small details. This change is complemented by the film's animation style, with full-color photography of real-life images being merged into the animated scenery. Bill rents a car and starts driving to nowhere in particular, only to find that his instinct takes him to his childhood home. His uncle gives him the location of a nursing home where Bill can find his biological father, whom he has not seen since childhood. After spending time with his father, Bill forgives him and leaves to continue driving. Feeling his health failing further, Bill stops to lay down under a tree, and the film cuts to black. Rejecting the reality that Bill will almost certainly die under the tree, the narrator instead describes a different outcome: Bill becomes immortal, accomplishes many wonderful achievements, and outlives humankind and all future inhabitants of Earth. He survives until the death of the universe, looking up at the stars as they disappear one by one.

In 1898, Daniel Plainview finds silver while prospecting in New Mexico but breaks his leg. Dragging himself from the pit, he takes a sample to an assay office and receives a silver and gold claim. In 1902, he discovers oil in California. Following the death of a worker in an accident, Daniel adopts his orphaned son, H.W., in order to pass himself off as a family man to potential investors. In 1911, Daniel is approached by Paul Sunday, a young man who tells him of an oil deposit in Little Boston. Daniel visits the Sundays' property in Little Boston and meets Paul's twin brother Eli, a preacher. Daniel attempts to purchase the farm from the Sundays at a bargain price under the ruse of using it to hunt quail, but his motives are questioned by Eli, who knows the land has oil. In exchange for the property, Eli demands $10,000 for his church. Plainview counters with a $5,000 offer, and an agreement is made and Daniel acquires all the available land in and around the Sunday property, except for the land owned by one holdout, William Bandy. After Daniel reneges on an agreement to let Eli bless the well before drilling begins, a series of misfortunes occur: an accident kills one worker and a gas blowout deafens H.W. and destroys the drilling infrastructure. When Eli publicly demands the money still owed to him, Daniel beats and humiliates him. At the dinner table that night, Eli attacks and berates his father for having trusted Daniel. A man arrives at Daniel's doorstep, claiming to be his half-brother, Henry. Later that night, H.W. sets fire to their shack. Daniel chases, restrains, and then sends H.W. to a school for the deaf in San Francisco. Standard Oil offers to buy out Daniel's local interests, but Daniel refuses and instead strikes a deal with Union Oil to build a pipeline. However, Bandy's ranch remains an impediment. Daniel becomes suspicious of Henry after he fails to recognize a childhood joke and confronts him one night at gunpoint. "Henry" confesses that he was a friend of the real Henry, who died of tuberculosis, and that he had impersonated Henry in the hope that Daniel could give him a job. An enraged Daniel murders him and buries his body. After looking through the real Henry's journal that the imposter Henry had with him revealing that the real Henry was traveling to meet him, Daniel drinks and weeps. The next morning, Daniel is awakened by Bandy, who knows of Daniel's crime and wants him to publicly repent in Eli's church in exchange for an easement to run his pipeline across the ranch. As part of his baptism, Eli humiliates Daniel and coerces him into confessing that he abandoned his child. Later, while the pipeline is being built, H.W. reunites with Daniel and Eli becomes a missionary. In 1927, H.W. marries Paul and Eli's sister Mary. Daniel, now extremely wealthy but an alcoholic, lives alone in a large mansion. H.W. asks his father to dissolve their partnership so that he can move to Mexico with Mary and start his own drilling company. Daniel angrily mocks H.W.'s deafness before revealing his true origins and disowning him as his son. H.W. finally leaves after thanking God he is not related to Daniel. Eli, now a radio preacher, visits a drunken Daniel in the bowling alley in his basement. Eli asks Daniel to partner with the church in drilling Bandy's property. Daniel agrees on the condition that Eli denounce his faith. Once Eli acquiesces, Daniel reveals that he already drained the property of its oil supply by capture and taunts Eli for his misfortune in investments he made when the market crashed. Daniel torments Eli further by telling him a lie about how he gave his brother $10,000 instead and is now a wealthy man. He chases Eli around the alley and bludgeons him to death with a bowling pin. When his butler appears to investigate the commotion, Daniel announces, "I'm finished."

In 2032, American middle school teacher and former molecular biologist Ryland Grace wakes up from an induced coma on the interstellar spacecraft Hail Mary, suffering from amnesia. Grace learns that he is the sole survivor of a three-person crew that was traveling towards the Tau Ceti system, 11.9 light-years from Earth. In a series of flashbacks, Grace recalls that scientists discovered a "Petrova line" of infrared light stretching from the Sun to Venus; a substance in the line, dubbed "astrophage", was proliferating on the Sun's surface, dimming the Sun at a rate that would cause catastrophic global cooling within thirty years. The head of the Petrova Taskforce, Eva Stratt, recruited Grace to study the astrophage due to his background in speculative astrobiology. Grace discovered that astrophage was composed of unicellular organisms that absorb electromagnetic radiation from the Sun and expel it for propulsion. He also learned how to breed the astrophage on Earth. Grace joined Stratt's Project Hail Mary, an international "long-shot" mission to send a crewed spacecraft to Tau Ceti, the only star in Earth's solar neighborhood not occluded by astrophage. Grace helped to breed astrophage fuel for the ship, and planned the crew's research tasks. The flight to Tau Ceti would be a suicide mission, as the ship could only carry enough fuel for a one-way trip; any findings would have to return to Earth in smaller space probes. In the present, Grace encounters an alien spacecraft (" Blip-A ") that docks with the Hail Mary. It is made of a solid form of xenon, which Grace dubs xenonite. The ship's occupant is a rock-like, five-legged alien from Erid, a planet in the 40 Eridani A system. Grace names the alien "Rocky", deduces that Eridians "see" via echolocation, and creates a machine translation system to interpret Rocky's musical language. Rocky is a mechanical engineer, and the sole survivor of the Eridians' mission to save their own star from astrophage infection. Grace and Rocky agree to work together, and quickly become close friends. As neither can survive in the other's atmosphere, Rocky works aboard the Hail Mary inside a pressurized ball of xenonite. Grace and Rocky study the Petrova line of the planet Tau Ceti e, which Grace names "Adrian", and discover that the line hosts an entire microbial biosphere. Rocky theorizes that microbial organisms in Adrian's atmosphere are consuming the astrophage, keeping the population in check. Learning that Grace cannot return home, Rocky agrees to share some of his own ship's astrophage fuel with the Hail Mary. Grace remembers that an astrophage explosion killed the original crew's science officers; with no time to train replacements, Stratt asked Grace to join the suicide mission, but he fearfully refused. During a risky maneuver to gather the astrophage predator from Adrian's atmosphere, a fuel leak causes the Hail Mary to spin uncontrollably, rendering Grace unconscious. Rocky breaks out of his ball to save Grace, but is severely injured. While Rocky recovers, Grace studies the captured astrophage predator, dubbing it "taumoeba" and selectively breeding it to survive the nitrogen in Venus's atmosphere. Rocky revives, and the two celebrate their success; Grace then recalls that Stratt had him drugged and put aboard the ship, believing he was the only one capable of completing the mission. Rocky and Grace say their goodbyes and begin their journeys back home. Shortly thereafter, Grace discovers that the taumoeba has developed a way to escape its xenonite breeding tanks, and is starting to consume Hail Mary ' s astrophage fuel. Grace transfers the taumoeba to plastic containers, but realizes that, as Rocky's ship is made entirely of xenonite, he will have no way to contain the taumoeba on his ship; it will eat his fuel, stranding him and dooming Erid. Grace decides to rescue Rocky and the Eridians rather than return home, and sends his video logs and taumoeba samples to Earth via the probes. Stratt and her team use the taumoeba to cure the Sun's astrophage infection. Meanwhile, on Erid, Grace lives in an Earth-like biodome the Eridians have constructed for him. Rocky informs him that Eridian scientists are able to prepare the Hail Mary for a return to Earth. Grace ponders the news before beginning another day of teaching science to Eridian children.