Nicolas Cage

You're an investigator; investigate.

When the most wanted man in America surfaces in a small Kentucky town, his violent history _ and a bloodthirsty mob seeking vengeance and a king's ransom _ soon follow. As brothers face off against one another and bullets tear the town to shreds, this lightning-fast gunslinger makes his enemies pay the ultimate price for their greed.

FBI Agent Lee Harker, a gifted recruit, is assigned the unsolved case of an elusive serial killer. While unearthing evidence, Harker discovers a personal connection to the merciless killer and must race against time to stop him before he claims the lives of another innocent family.

A man returns to the idyllic beach of his childhood to surf with his son. When he is humiliated by a group of locals, the man is drawn into a conflict that keeps rising and pushes him to his breaking point. A man returns to the idyllic beach of his childhood to surf with his son. But his desire to hit the waves is thwarted by a group of locals whose mantra is "don't live here, don't surf here." Humiliated and angry, the man is drawn into a conflict that keeps rising in concert with the punishing heat of the summer and pushes him to his breaking point.

Matt (Nicolas Cage) is forced out of retirement when his estranged daughter is hunted by the Mob.

A Social media Influencer has attained all the fame she ever needed but her one mistake from the past comes to haunt her.

Creatively unfulfilled and facing financial ruin, the fictionalized version of Cage must accept a $1 million offer to attend the birthday of a dangerous superfan. Things take a wildly unexpected turn when Cage is recruited by a CIA operative and forced to live up to his own legend: Nick Cage.

A nomadic prospector discovers a massive deposit of rare substance and must fight to keep his find.

A secluded farm is struck by a strange meteorite which has apocalyptic consequences for the family living there and possibly the world.

Three strangers' lives are inevitably entangled in a conflict none of them are prepared for. A hotel room shootout between two assassins kicks off a long night of bodies falling like dominoes, as we follow a chain of crooked cops, gangsters, hitmen, a femme Fatale and an ex-mercenary through a confluence of murder, betrayal, revenge and redemption.

Frank Walsh (Nicolas Cage), a big-game hunter for zoos has booked passage on a ship, where a dangerous criminal is also imprisoned. Frank recently found an extremely rare white jaguar in the rain forests of Brazil while sitting on a wooden platform high above in a tree and using a goat as bait. The jaguar weighs 400 pounds and had stuck the goat with such force that the tranquilizer gun was knocked off Frank's hand and to the ground below. The jaguar discovered Frank on the wooden platform and attacked him by jumping high into the tree. The jaguar strikes Frank on the lower leg and as a result both of them loose balance and fall to the ground. Fortunately, Frank had one tranquilizer cartilage in his pocket and managed to inject it into the jaguar's neck before falling. The jaguar falls unconscious before it can gather its senses and attack Frank again. The locals believe the white Jaguar to be an evil spirit (and refer to it as the "Ghost Cat") whom they offer human sacrifices to keep their village safe. His assistant Diego (Pablo Tufino) refuses to help him move the animal because of local superstition. Frank expects to sell the jaguar to a zoo for a fortune. Frank books a container ship to deliver the jaguar along with other animals to the U.S. Frank drives the lorry with the caged Jaguar, and the other animals that he captured during his trip, to the port. US Marshals also need the ship to transport a notorious political assassin and ex-special forces operative, Richard Loffler, who is being extradited in order to be brought to trial. As Frank preps to transport his Jaguar across the ocean to the US, he finds that criminal Richard Loffler (Kevin Durand) is also being transported on the same ship, escorted by FBI agents. Richard has killed a US Senator and is being arrested for crimes against humanity. Dr. Ellen Taylor (Famke Janssen) is a neurologist and travels with Richard to monitor his mental health. Richard is ex-Navy himself and went rouge. Ellen tells Frank, at lunch in the ship's cafeteria, that Richard has a brain condition that can kill him if the atmospheric pressure changes. That is why flying him to the US is not an option. Richard is chained to a chair inside a cage in the cargo hold of the ship which also holds all the animals that Frank is transporting to the US in their respective cages. Paul Freed is the FBI attorney on the ship. The ship is headed to Puerto Rico, 1993 nautical miles away. 2 FBI agents are posted outside Richard's cage at all times. Morales (Braulio Castillo Jr.) is the captain of the ship. The white jaguar is worth a million dollars to Frank. Frank intends to auction it to the highest bidder, but Ellen wants him to turn the cat over the endangered species bureau. Frank and Ellen butt heads as Ellen finds Frank to be arrogant and dishonest and tells him so. Frank believes that tigers and polar bears are the only 2 animals known to eat men. He believes that jaguars cannot be man eaters and rubbishes the local superstition around the white jaguar. Inevitably, Richard fakes a seizure to lure the guards into the cage. He then kills his guards and escapes captivity. John Ringer (LaMonica Garrett) is in charge of the FBI team and launches his remaining team to find Richard. Richard has let loose some of the vicious monkeys from Frank's hold, who end up killing some of the ship's crew. Richard has a radio & uses that to communicate with Frank. Frank tells him that he was military himself and served as a mechanic for 4 years. Richard says he did not like when the military trained him to be an assassin for life and then one day told to leave everything and come home. Frank finds that Richard has let loose most of his animals, including 2 venomous snakes. Richard has also stopped the water pumps on the ship. The Jaguar & the snake end up killing more men on the ship. One group of crew members escape in a lifeboat, leaving Frank, Ellen, and several others behind on the ship. Richard takes control of the command section of the ship, keys in coordinates and then destroys all controls. Finally, Richard attacks and kills John Ringer and most of his team. Frank still doesn't want to abandon ship as he believes a white jaguar is a once in a lifetime catch and plus this is his only chance since he didn't have permits to transport any of them. Turns out FBI man Paul Freed (Michael Imperioli) is working from the inside for Richard and helps him stay ahead in the game by feeding him vital intel on FBI tactics and next steps. The remaining engineers on the ship shut down the engines in order to stop Richard from escaping to the Caribbean Islands, as this was the new course he had set into the ship's computers. Richard uses the radio to impersonate John Ringer and call in the coast guard to mount a rescue. Frank finds Richard, who now has Ellen in his custody. Richard takes Ellen and a young crewman named Rafael (Jeremy Nazario) hostage. Richard is eventually subdued by Walsh who uses his expert skills to capture him. Frank is about to kill Richard, when Paul intervenes. Richard tells Frank that Paul is NSA who hired Richard to kill NSA targets in South America. He now has enough intel to tie the drug cartels directly to NSA officials, which is why Paul wants him alive, so he can profit from that information. Richard kills Paul, but both Frank and Richard are injured. Frank stuns Richard with a Neurotoxin dart and captures him in a noose and lets loose the white jaguar to eat him alive. Frank rescues Ellen and Rafael from a venomous viper. As the coast guard reaches the ship, the captain asks Frank about the paperwork on his animals. Ellen lies that Richard destroyed Frank's paperwork and she saw that everything was in order.

A young woman in a coma appears to be possessed by the soul of a tormented man's dead wife. The story follows Joe, (Cage), a down-on-his-luck truck driver haunted by the memory of his deceased wife and child. He meets Julie (Potente), a spiritually gifted woman who enlists Joe in a desperate effort to find the lost soul of her comatose daughter, Billie (Mitchell). But the spirit of Joe's dead wife Mary proves stronger, possessing the young woman's body and determined to settle her unfinished business with the living. —Anonymous

While on a routine patrol, an aging cop, his partner and their ride-along, get caught in a standoff with a band of former mercenaries robbing a bank.

The film begins with a bizarre text which reads, "When I die, Bury me deep, Lay two speakers at my feet, Wrap some speakers around my head, And rock and roll me." It then opens on a scene with a lumberjack named Red Miller ( Nicolas Cage ), working in the forest before leaving in a helicopter. It then turns to show his wife Mandy ( Andrea Riseborough ) sketching predatory animals and smoking marijuana. Red returns home to Mandy and talk about planets and stars as well as the Marvel character "Galactus." Mandy and Red are then shown in a montage that shows them in a beautiful lake on a boat, and then looking at each other through fire, looking at each other as if they know something terrible awaits them. Mandy then wanders into the woods and finds a dead fawn, symbolizing the death of innocence. Mandy tells Red of a time in which she was younger and almost peer-pressured into killing a starling. Upon reading a dark fantasy novel, Mandy begins to fear that something evil will happen to her. Upon traveling a road, she passes a truck with its passenger, Jeremiah Sand, eyeing her mysteriously. Jeremiah becomes obsessed with Mandy and tells his acolytes of how he NEEDS Mandy. Brother Swan and Lucy, apostles of Sand, call up a team of Satanic deformed Bikers. Swan gives them a jug of hideous LSD which they take and demand another sacrifice, stating, "Blood for Blood." Mandy is kidnapped by Sand's apostles, an old whore named Marlene among them, where they drug Mandy and Marlene stings her in the throat with a giant wasp, calling it "The Cherry on Top." A delirious Mandy is brought before Sand. Sand explains that he was a failed musician who "Found God" and founded a religious cult, before exposing himself to her, to which she laughs hysterically, enraging Sand into believing that he is being rejected. Sand brings his sister Lucy before Red, who he has captured and tied up with barbed wire. He seeks to demonstrate Lucy's love for Sand by forcing her to shoot herself in the temple. Red screams for her to stop but she pulls the trigger, which it revealed to be empty. Swan then comes and presents Red with a blade. Sand compares himself to Jesus and calls Red a "soulless pig" before stabbing him with the blade. Mandy is then dragged out in a bag, hung by a tree and then burned to death before Red. Red screams in horror and pulls himself free from the bonds, and mourns over Mandy's ashes. A broken Red returns home and watches a bizarre trailer of a "Cheddar Goblin." He falls asleep and has an animated nightmare before awakening and having an emotional breakdown.He goes to his friend's place in a camper, who tells Red that the satanic biker gang is called the "Black Skulls" who became deformed after taking some terrible LSD which made them hideous. Red forges an ax and heads after the Biker Gang. The title screen of "Mandy" spreads out upon the screen. Red chases after the biker gang, shooting one off his bike with a cross bow before ramming into him with his car. He falls unconscious from the collision and awakens in the "Black Skulls'" Lair, his left hand nailed to the floor. He is beaten by a Black Skull guard before gaining the upper hand by beating him down with a pipe and sending him down a deep chasm nearby. Red arms himself with a box cutter and body armor before investigating the place. He finds a dead elderly couple, obviously victims of the biker gang. He enters another room, seeing a Black Skull watching pornography and snorting cocaine. Red attacks this Black Skull and slits his throat with the box cutter after a brief scuffle, the Black Skull's blood drenching into his face with Red laughing maniacally. He is then attacked by another Black Skull who enters the room with a shotgun. Red attacks him and snaps his neck, getting caught up with joy in the violence. He rewards himself by snorting cocaine off of a broken shard of glass. He then notices a jug of the LSD the bikers have been drinking and takes a small taste of it out of curiosity. He sees a bizarre series of apocalyptic nightmarish scenes before coming to his senses. Red exits the lair and kills the remaining Black Skull with his ax. The Black Skull states, "She's still burning" to which an enraged Red hacks him to pieces after setting him on fire. Red approaches a nearby tower where he meets the chemist, who had made the LSD which deformed the biker gang. The chemist has a pet tiger which Red frees from a cage after the Chemist receives telepathic information and tells Red to head north to find Sand's lair. Red catches up with Lucy and Swan. He kills Swan by impaling him through the mouth with the bladed handle of his ax. He leaves Lucy, realizing she is merely a Puppet of Sand and no threat to him. He nears the lair of Sand, a converted satanic church where he kills Sand's attacking apostles with his ax and a chainsaw. He enters the church with Marlene who offers her services to him. Red instead decapitates her and taunts Jeremiah Sand with her severed head. Sand at first declares that he is protected by God and will not be hurt by Red, but then whimpers and begs Red for mercy. Red instead seizes him by the head. Sand screams and even offers him oral sex so that he will be saved. Telling Sand, "I'm your God now!" Red crushes Sand's head into jelly before burning the church. He enters his car and drives off, imagining that he is seeing Mandy sitting in the passenger's seat, smiling at him. It is revealed that Red is in a bizarre bloody state of deformity in reality- obviously deformed by his revenge quest and the LSD, and is hallucinating Mandy. As he drives off, it is revealed that the world he is in now is a bizarre inferno of madness that is not our own. The credits are red text on a black screen and is mute as there is no background music to be heard.

Arsenal tells the intertwining stories of the Lindel brothers, Mikey and JP, who had only each other to rely on growing up. As adults, JP found success as the owner of a construction company, while Mikey became a small-time mobster, mired in a life of petty crime. When Mikey is kidnapped and held for a ransom by ruthless crime boss Eddie King , JP turns to the brothers' old pal Sal, a plain clothes detective for help. In order to rescue his brother, JP must risk everything and unleash his vengeance against King's relentless army of gangsters.

My Autopsy is a story of the progression of a woman's strength as she journeys to escape the invisible chains of a past abusive relationship.

A professor, Mike Lawford frantically searches for his son Charlie, who was abducted during a Halloween carnival. As nearly a year goes by, the parents are still looking for their son and starting to hear and see their son reaching out to them from the other world-Mike sees his son on a passing bus, but upon chasing the bus down and gaining access, his son is not there. He disembarks and notices spray painted on a building, "pay the ghost," the phrase his son uttered before vanishing. He enters the building and finds homeless people living there. Unearthly screams of a woman are heard, and a blind homeless man calls for the others to mask their fires, explaining to Mike that the screams are heard every year before Halloween. Mike asks about the phrase, and is taken to a wall with more of the same phrases written on it. Engrossed by the wall and the homeless man, he does not notice the wall behind him shift into another world, and a demonic figure briefly appears behind him, then vanishes. The homeless man explains nothing, but quickly tells Mike to leave. His wife Kristen later sees their son's scooter move on its own, and calls him. Later that night while pouring wine, the power in their home goes out. Mike looks out the window to see three children appear and burned at the stake, then turns and sees his apartment crowded with figures of children, standing lifeless and pale. They call a psychic to investigate. Standing in their son's room, she senses nothing, but then abruptly walks to the window, looks at the approaching storm, and says, "It's here... it has all the children." The psychic is then thrown against the wall and strangled before collapsing, burn scars all over her hands. A later autopsy shows her internal organs were burned to ash. Later, Mike walks upstairs to his wife's room, and she addresses him with their son's voice, pleading for help and saying "She's coming, Dad. I'm scared." He walks closer, and sees his wife cutting herself. Cleaning the wound, they find a symbol, which leads them to a Celtic Halloween celebration. A participant explains that the children are burning dolls to pay the ghost, so they will not be taken. Their friend Hannah who was helping them by doing research calls Mike and says: In early New York, on Halloween night of 1679, because of her Celtic worship, a young widow living on the first New York settlement was burned alive with her three children by an angry mob of settlers suspecting her to be a witch. She takes revenge every year on Halloween, when the border between the spiritual world and the physical world dissolves for a short time. Since then, every Halloween the ghost of this woman takes three living children from their parents and puts them in an alternate world. The borders solidify until next Halloween, and the children taken are able to reach out and be rescued. But if the children cannot escape this alternate world within the first year, they are stuck in this world forever. After Mike and Kristen are injured in the taxi by a flock of black vultures, Hannah is thrown out of a window and killed while trying to leave the institute. Mike returns to the same building and finds the blind homeless man again, he gives him his watch in exchange for helping him find his son Charlie. He shows Mike the hazy road and tells him that he has until Halloween ends at midnight, otherwise he will be trapped there forever. Mike arrives at the widow's cabin and goes down to the basement where he finds the souls of many children who were locked up over the centuries at Halloween time. Mike finally finds Charlie along with two other children that were also taken within the last year. While the four of them are escaping, the ghost widow appears as she has learned that they were attempting to escape. She tries to stop Mike from taking the three children away by trying to kill him. All of the other children's souls arrive to help him, and they are able to kill the ghost widow by surrounding her, unknowingly freeing themselves into the afterlife. Mike and the children manage to get out just as the portal closes. At dawn, Mike and his son Charlie finally make it home. While reuniting with Kristen it is revealed that Charlie has no recollection of the time that he spent missing. Outside, a black vulture is seen flying away. In a scene mid-credits, three black vultures appear surrounding Hannah's corpse and she awakens, possessed.

While looking for a new home, The Croods come across a more evolved caveman named Guy. Together they explore fantastic creatures and a whole new world of adventure!

Director Simon West and Nicolas Cage team-up for the first time since the 1997 blockbuster CON AIR for STOLEN, a unique fast paced action thriller that takes place during 10 frantic hours on Mardi Gras day in New Orleans. The film also stars Josh Lucas, Danny Huston, Malin Akerman, Sami Gayle, Mark Valley and M.C. Gainey. The story follows Will Montgomery (played by Nicolas Cage), a master thief who has been sent to prison for 8 years after being double-crossed in a heist gone awry. Upon his release, hes ready to leave his criminal past behind and rebuild his relationship with estranged daughter, Alison Loeb (played by Sami Gayle). Montgomery`s former criminal cohorts and FBI agent Tim Harlend (played by Danny Huston), are all convinced that the loot, totaling $10 Million dollars worth of bonds, was hidden away by Montgomery before he was sentenced. In order to get his hands on it, former partner in crime, Vincent (played by Josh Lucas), kidnaps Alison and demands the loot as ransom; keeping her in a soundproofed trunk of a taxi cab on Mardi Gras day where she is nearly impossible to be discovered. Montgomery has only one day to deliver the $10 Million ransom, but much to the disbelief of both Vincent and the FBI, he does not actually have it. Montgomery is left with only one choice: To trust his instincts and join forces again with another old partner in crime, the beautiful, sexy and smart Riley Jeffers (played by Malin Akerman). Together they must pull off one more heist so he can get his daughter back before its too late. ``I think the cast is outstanding and what makes one movie better or stand out from another is really the screenplay and cast. On top of that we have a master filmmaker of this genre and someone who will keep shooting until he`s got it- someone who`s a perfectionist which I prefer to work with``. - Nicolas Cage

Nicolas Cage returns as Johnny Blaze in GHOST RIDER SPIRIT OF VENGEANCE. Still struggling with his curse as the devil`s bounty hunter, Johnny is hiding out in a remote part of Europe when he is recruited by a secret sect of the church to save a young boy from the devil. At first, Johnny is reluctant to embrace the power of the Ghost Rider, but it is the only way to protect the boy and possibly rid himself of his curse forever.

The Beauty Strip is a film about erotic interpretation. Film about individual erotic perception featuring soundtrack by: Zigo Rayonpineal with Sharpnoise, Occurrences in Rain, Names, Bob Orum, Unknown_Variable and Bassex. Headphones suggested.

Monks reveal the source of the Black Plague after a suspected witch is transported to a monastery by 14th century knights.

Bounty killers compete for body count, fame and a fat stack of cash. They're ending the plague of corporate greed and providing the survivors of the apocalypse with retribution. This is the age of the BOUNTY KILLER. It's been 20 years since the corporations took over the world's governments. Their thirst for power and profits led to the corporate wars, a fierce global battle that laid waste to society as we know it. Born from the ash, the Council of Nine rose as a new law and order for this dark age. To avenge the corporations' reckless destruction, the Council issues death warrants for all white collar criminals. Their hunter's - the BOUNTY KILLER. From amateur savage to graceful assassin, the BOUNTY KILLERS now compete for body count, fame and a fat stack of cash. They're ending the plague of corporate greed by exterminating the self serving CEO and providing the survivors of the apocalypse with retribution. These are the new heroes. This is the age of the BOUNTY KILLER. —PR It's been 10 years since the corporations took over the world's governments. Their thirst for power and profits led to the Corporate Wars, a fierce global battle that laid waste to society as we know it. Born from the ash, the Council of Nine rose as a new law and order for this dark age. To avenge the corporations' reckless destruction, the Council issues death warrants for all white collar criminals. Their hunters -- the bounty killer. From amateur savage to graceful assassin, the bounty killers now compete for body count, fame and a fat stack of cash. They're ending the plague of corporate greed by exterminating the self serving CEO and providing the survivors of the apocalypse with retribution. These are the new heroes. This is the age of the BOUNTY KILLER. —balicollie In a post-apocalyptic world destroyed by the corporation's war, the Bounty Killers are very popular, hunting down former executives and receiving large amounts as reward. Mary Death and her mentor, Drifter, are the most popular bounty killers. Drifter hires the gun caddy Jack LeMans and soon he learns that he is wanted by the Council of Nine. He decides to travel to see the council to clarify the death warrant and teams-up with Jack, Mary Death and his acquaintance Jimbo in a dangerous journey to learn what has happened with the Nine Council. —Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

A hitman who's in Bangkok to pull off a series of jobs violates his personal code when he falls for a local woman and bonds with his errand boy. Joe is a professional hitman who picks someone off the street to do his errands, and after he is finished kills that person. His next assignment takes him to Bangkok, and as usual, he finds a streetwise guy named Kong to help him. After Kong has a close call and learns who Joe is, Kong asks him to train him and he does. Joe also meets a local girl who is deaf and spends time with her, but he has a hard time keeping his other life from her. It also appears that the person who hired Joe has broken his rule of complete anonymity and tries to find him. —rcs0411@yahoo.com Joe, an international hit man who follows a simple code, arrives in Bangkok for his last contract - four kills and then retirement. He hires Kong, a local street hustler, to run his errands, and he gets to work. By the second hit, Joe has started violating his four rules, losing his anonymity, leaving behind traces, and getting emotionally involved. Only one rule remains intact: don't ask questions. Can Joe regain his footing and get out alive? —<jhailey@hotmail.com> The American professional assassin was hired by the Thai mafia boss to do the assignment by killing four people. The assassin get the order by the pickpocket who later becomes his disciple. Everything looks alright, but after the third target killing. Joe found that he was betrayed, he decided to quit the job. However, when he was hunt and his disciple was caught as the hostage. The assassin decided to end all of the problem and give the gang's payback. —Kankawin25013 The hit man Joe is a professional killer with a peculiar code of honor and modus-operandi. He travels to Bangkok to kill four persons and he hires the smalltime hoodlum Kong to help him in his job. When he meets the deaf and dumb Fon in a pharmacy, he falls in love with her and breaks his code. Further, he teaches Kong how to become a hit man. But when Kong is abducted by Surat, who had hired Joe for the assignment in Bangkok, he is forced to betray Joe. But the hit man decides to rescue Kong in his last job. —Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Cris Johnson (Nicolas Cage) is a Las Vegas magician who possesses the unique ability to witness the events of the immediate future moments before they happen. As a child Cris was subjected to a series of cruel experiments by government scientists and doctors, but a change of name and a new identity allowed him to elude detection and start a new life. He now earns his living as a low-rent magician while earning a little extra cash at the blackjack tables. Until this day, Cris has never used his powers to do anything substantial, but when he experiences a vision of Los Angeles being incinerated in a nuclear holocaust, he realizes that he could save a million lives. Now, Cris is in a dilemma. Even after lying low for years he hasn't completely escaped detection from his former captors and the FBI counter terror agent Callie Ferris (Julianne Moore) sets out in search of Cris in order to convince him to use his exceptional powers to prevent the nuclear holocaust from becoming a terrifying reality. He is now forced to choose between saving himself and saving others.

A kid who hates ants, Lucas Nickle (voice of Zach Tyler Eisen), finds himself living among them. His family has just moved to a new town, but Lucas isn`t enjoying it much. To make matters worse, the local bully has found Lucas and is making his life miserable, so the boy looks for someone he can push around -- and he soon finds a large colony of ants in his yard. Lucas takes out his frustrations by stomping, drowning, and burying the bugs, little realizing the ants see him as a threat to their safety and aren`t about take his attacks lying down. Zoc (voice of Nicolas Cage) is a ``wizard ant`` who creates a formula that shrinks Lucas to the size of an insect, and the tiny boy is brought before the leader of the Ant Council (voice of Ricardo Montalban) and the Queen of the Colony (voice of Meryl Streep) to answer for his crimes against the ants. Showing compassion, the queen sentences Lucas not to death, but to live among them and see how difficult their circumstances can be. From here, Lucas also gathers courage and support to put up a fight against the diabolic bully, Stan!

On September 11, 2001, Port Authority Police officers John McLoughlin (Nicholas Cage) got up from a night's sleep at his usual time and got ready for a day of duty. John's wife Donna (Maria Bello) is still sleeping as he heads into work. People use various modes of transport to come into Mahattan. At the station, McLoughlin is in charge of assigning the daily duties to his officers. McLoughlin and Will Jimeno (Michael Pena), who are patrolling the Port Authority Bus Terminal in Midtown Manhattan, see a plane fly dangerously low overhead. As all of the police officers return to the station, they see on TV and that the North Tower of the World Trade Center has been hit by a plane. When the plane hit the tower, a shudder was felt even inside the station. Sergeant McLoughlin assigns many of the officers (including Colovito (Nicholas Turturro), Polnicki (Ned Eisenberg), Washington, O'Reilly, Jimeno, Hogart, Bavli, Rodrigues, Giraldi (Danny Nucci), Pezzulo, Stolman, and others) to assist in an evacuation attempt of the still undamaged South Tower and they board a commandeered Metropolitan Transit Authority bus. On the bus, they hear reports that the South Tower has also been hit. McLoughlin informs Lieutenant John Kassimatis (Nick Damici) that while the NYPD is prepared for many kinds of attacks such as car bombs, chemical, biological and so on, but they are not prepared for an attack of this size and scale. They never planned for it and as such there is no equipment with the force to deal with it. There are expected to be 50/60,000 people inside the 2 towers. Jimeno tries to call his wife Allison (Maggie Gyllenhaal), but the phones are not working. When they arrive at the World Trade Center, they realize the extent of the disaster and see one of the first victims to jump out of the towers to a certain death. Paper from the offices inside the 2 towers is flying everywhere and the towers are spewing smoke. Sergeant John McLoughlin, veteran of the 1993 bombing, assembles a group of volunteers to evacuate the towers. Not everyone was keen to go. The group consists of McLoughlin, Jimeno, Dominick Pezzulo (Jay Hernandez) and Antonio Rodrigues (Armando Riesco). They enter the complex through Building # 5, to grab their safety equipment (mainly oxygen tanks and cutters) from the police desk. The men enter the concourse between the towers. An officer named Chris Amoroso (Jon Bernthal) appears to inform them of other events, such as the attack on the Pentagon and the second plane's hit on the South Tower, though the group does not accept this. The group meets Officer Reynolds (Tom Wright) who was also helping with the evacuations. McLoughlin grabs more tanks as spare to help people that they find trapped. As the men prepare to enter the North Tower, the buildings begin to rumble. McLoughlin realizes that the South Tower is collapsing onto them and that their only chance of survival is to run into the service elevator shaft. Chris trips and does not have time to get up. Rodrigues is unable to get to the shaft in time. McLoughlin, Jimeno and Pezzulo manage to escape the huge amounts of dust and rubble flying down from the South Tower. However, as the rubble continues to crush the elevator shaft, the three are trapped. McLoughlin knew that the elevator shaft is the strongest part of the building and hence was their best chance of survival. As the cascade of debris subsides, Pezzulo realizes he can free himself and manages to move nearer to Jimeno who, along with McLoughlin, is pinned under rubble and cannot move. Pezzulo tries but fails to shift the debris covering Jimeno's legs. Pezzulo wanted to go out and find help but is told by McLoughlin not to leave. As Pezzulo becomes optimistic that they will live, the rumbling begins again as the North Tower starts to collapse. Although Jimeno and McLoughlin are not further harmed, Pezzulo is fatally injured when a concrete slab crushes his torso. Pezzulo manages to fire his sidearm once into the air, in an attempt to alert rescuers to their whereabouts just before dying. Jimeno and McLoughlin spend hours under the rubble, in pain but exchanging personal information. McLoughlin continues to communicate on his wireless device but gets no response. Both are thirsty, but there is no water. McLoughlin's knees are crushed together. The duo are buried under several feet of rubble and topside there is absolute mayhem as the 2 towers are completely demolished. The news of the attacks on America reverberates around the world. Several hundred police and fire rescue officers are reported missing and unaccounted for. Allison and Donna have no clue if their husbands are alive or not. Donna is glued to the TV hoping to see McLoughlin. When Building 7 collapses, both men scream and accept their demise, but they survive without further harm. They survive burning gas flares and raining debris, which was also on fire. McLoughlin is particularly anxious to keep Jimeno from falling asleep. Jimeno is bleeding inside, and McLoughlin knows that if he goes to sleep, he may not be revived later. Jimeno also realizes that by straining to grab a metal bar above his body, he can make a noise that rescuers might hear. Two United States Marines, Dave Karnes (Michael Shannon) and Jason Thomas (William Mapother), who are searching for survivors, do hear it and find the men, calling for help to dig them out. Jimeno is rescued first, and then hours later McLoughlin is lifted out of the debris, barely alive. Both men are reunited with their families at the hospital and undergo medical treatment, including extensive surgeries, and McLoughlin is placed in a medically induced coma. In 2003, Jimeno and McLoughlin, both medically retired from duty, attend a celebratory barbecue with their families. The epilogue reveals that both men were two of twenty people found alive at Ground Zero, and they were numbers eighteen and nineteen, respectively. David Karnes reenlisted in the Marines and served two tours in the Iraq War.

Dave Spritz (Nicolas Cage), a weatherman without meteorological qualifications in Chicago, is confronted with his own rage that life hasn't proceeded as he had planned. A successful and talented man, Dave finds it difficult to see his own talent because he compares himself with his Pulitzer winning, distant father Robert (Michael Caine). Robert won the award when he was 33 years old. Robert is undergoing medical tests but while he gets Dave to drive to the doctor's appointments, he doesn't allow Dave to attend the appointments and keeps the whole diagnosis and follow-up secret from him. Not to mention that "fans" delight in recognizing him on the street and throwing food at him. Dave suspects, because they're resentful of how easy his high-paying job is. Dave makes $240,000 a year for 2 hours of work every day. He makes money with public appearances as well. People expect that since Dave is on TV and is a public figure, so he has a moral duty to oblige them with autographs and photographs, as requested. The other problems in his life, an angry ex-wife Noreen (Hope Davis), a daughter Shelly (Gemmenne De La Pena) bullied at school and a son Mike (Nicholas Hoult) just leaving rehab don't help. Don Bowden (Gil Bellows) is a counselor at Mike's school. Don is showing too much interest in Mike. Don takes Mike out for a movie. And Dave would really rather just think about sex. The situation worsens when Robert is diagnosed with Lymphoma and given only a few months to live. Dave tries to connect with Shelly but taking her to a parent-child ice skating potato sack race at the public skating rink. Dave finds cigarettes in Shelly's backpack and realizes that she might still be addicted. Dave pushes Shelly to finish the race, even though she tangles her foot in the sack and falls to the ground. Shelly ends up damaging the tendons in her leg. Robert makes Dave realize that Shelly wears tight fitting clothes and is hence teased as "Camel Toe" by her colleagues at school. Dave wants to reconcile with Noreen and work out issues between them, but she is already seeing Russ. Dave doesn't like Russ interfering in matters concerning Dave's children. Dave and Noreen attend a trust building session, but Dave reacts badly to Noreen's criticism of his science fiction novel, and Noreen decides that Dave has not changed at all. Noreen tells Dave that she hates him and that they can never be back together again. As he becomes more and more depressed, Dave takes up archery, finding the activity a way to build his focus and calm his nerves. Dave was introduced to archery when Shelly took it up as a hobby. After spending $170 on equipment and purchasing a 5-class lesson plan, Shelly gives up the hobby after a single class as she can't get hold of the bow. Dave returns to the range to take up the remaining lessons. Dave gets better at archery and feels a little good about himself. Dave uses what he learned to teach Shelly archery all over again. Shelly says that she is not interested in archery and only wanted to try archery as she wanted to hunt animals. Meanwhile, Don takes Mike to his home, and Don seduces Mike into taking his clothes off on the pretext of taking some modeling photos of Mike. To prove himself to his father and possibly reconcile with Noreen, his estranged wife, Dave pursues a weatherman position with a national talk show called Hello America. The job would nearly quadruple his salary but means relocating to New York City. When Hello America invites him to New York, he takes his daughter with him and bonds with her by helping her shop for a more suitable wardrobe that hides her camel toe. Shelly says that she knows she is called Camel Toe at school. She believes that camel toes are tough, as camels roam all over the desert. This means her colleagues see Shelly as tough, and she likes that. While away, Dave learns that his son attacked his counselor Don, claiming that the man wanted to perform oral sex on him. Don claims that Mike tried to steal his wallet and they were only having an argument. Noreen is no help as she strongly indicates that Dave is an absentee dad, and the only reason Mike is in this trouble is because Dave does not pay any attention to him. Despite this stress and an all-night drinking binge, Dave impresses the Hello America interviewers and is eventually offered the job. The job pays $1.2 million including all the perks and bonuses. When he returns, Dave slaps Russ (Michael Rispoli), Noreen's boyfriend, when he finds him dealing with his son's predicament. Dave later confronts the counselor at his home, beating him up and warning him that he is in store for worse. The family holds a living funeral for Robert, in which Dave asks Noreen to reconcile and move to New York, but she has decided to marry Russ. Dave blames Russ for Noreen's refusal to try things again with him. He takes out his bow and arrow from the car trunk and takes aim at Russ when he comes out of the funeral for a smoke. But Dave does not shoot the arrow. But his stunt is noticed by Noreen and Robert. Dave delivers his eulogy at Robert's living funeral, but he is interrupted when the power goes out. It returns after 40 minutes, but by then everyone forgot that he was delivering his eulogy. Dave and Robert have one final talk, in which Dave breaks down in tears, unsure of his life's choices. Robert consoles him, telling him that he has time to "chuck" the garbage of his life. Robert dies soon after. Several months later, Dave has accepted the job and moved to New York. People have ceased throwing things at him though, he muses, this may be a pleasant side-effect of his archery hobby, for which he carries a bow.

A con man with an obsessive-compulsive disorder finds that his orderly life and latest scam are threatened by the reappearance of a teenage daughter he never knew existed.

A University of Texas professor of philosophy and capital punishment abolitionist, David Gale, is on Death Row convicted of the rape and murder of his best friend, Constance Harraway, who was the leader of the local branch of Death Watch, an organization campaigning against the death penalty. Days before his execution, skeptical journalist Bitsey Bloom is sent by the weekly news magazine where she works to conduct David Gale's final interview. She is accompanied by intern reporter, Zack Stemmons. Gale's lawyer is Braxton Belyeu, an ageing eccentric with a long ponytail. We learn that Gale asked specifically for Bloom, and will talk only to her. They are to have two hours on each of three consecutive days, after which Gale will be executed at 6 o'clock in the evening of the fourth day. Belyeu and Stemmons leave the prison and Gale starts to tell Bloom his story, which we see in a series of flashbacks. Gale's marriage was in difficulties, and relations with his wife Sharon strained, but he was devoted to his small son Jamie. We see Gale lecturing on philosophy to a large class of students. Then a couple of minutes before the end of the lecture period a beautiful female student named Berlin arrives noisily and Gale pauses while she takes her seat. As the students leave after dismissal, Berlin apologizes for being late and tells Gale she'll do "anything" for a better term mark. He tells her quietly but firmly that the way to get a better mark is to study. However, not long after that Gale finds himself one evening at a party with faculty and students, and Berlin catches him alone in a luxurious bathroom. Locking the door, she tells him she isn't his student any more (since she's been expelled from school), and that she wants sex with him anyway. Gale gives in to temptation but soon finds himself accused of rape. His world falls apart: he loses his university post; his wife leaves him, taking their son, selling their house and moving to Spain; even the national leader of Death Watch (by phone) wants local organizer Constance Harraway to have no more to do with him. We see Gale sitting distraught on the step of the path to his house front door, clutching his little boy's favorite soft toy to him, as his wife and son are driven away in a taxi; we see him in a conversation with a university dean who explains there is no way he can give Gale a job because of his reputation; and we see him in an interview attempting to get a job in business and hopelessly lost when asked to give three reasons why they should hire him. Gale, now jobless and homeless, turns heavily to drink; we see him in a bar, then staggering along a crowded sidewalk at night shouting about Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle to passers-by; and at last he winds up on the porch of his only remaining friend in the world, Constance Harraway. He now learns, as a result of an emergency when she has to go to hospital, that she is dying of leukemia. He has to sleep off his drunken stupor on a seat in the hospital corridor. After she is home again, Constance is talking to David one evening about her one regret in life, that she didn't have more sex. He offers and, having assured her it isn't out of pity, she accepts. He leaves in the morning but she is subsequently found dead --- naked, handcuffed behind her back, with her mouth taped over with gaffer tape, and suffocated by a plastic bag that is over her head and taped round the neck. An autopsy reveals that she had swallowed the handcuff key. David Gale's semen is also found inside her. A tripod --- on which no fingerprints were found --- is present, though no camera or videotape is found. Bloom and Stemmons visit Harraway's former house, which has been turned into a sort of museum with a "tour" of the crime scene by the current tenant Nico, a plump young woman with a goth appearance. After the prison visit one afternoon, Bloom and Stemmons collect half a million dollars in cash in a shiny brief case. The money is the "fee" paid by their magazine to Gale for the exclusive interview. They then return to their motel to find her door blocked open with a roll of gaffer tape, and a videotape cassette suspended by a string from the ceiling of her room, labelled with her name. They borrow a video player from the motel manager and are profoundly shocked to find that the tape has the last few minutes of Constance Harraway's life, of her naked, cuffed and suffocating on her kitchen floor. From time to time while driving between the motel and the prison, Bloom and Stemmons have noticed a lean figure of a man in a stetson hat, apparently following or watching them. They discover who this man is: Dusty Wright, a secretive loner but a follower and admirer of Constance Harraway. Bloom delivers the attaché case full of cash to the lawyer Belyeu's office, and spies Wright entering just as she is leaving. Assuming that Gale is telling the truth when protesting his innocence of the rape and murder, there is speculation as to who did the murder and apparently framed him. Candidates include some mysterious group trying to discredit the abolitionist cause. However, after the third and last interview with David Gale at the prison, at the end of which he takes his leave saying he'll be dead by the end of the next day, Bloom and Stemmons return to the "museum" with handcuffs and gaffer tape, and Bloom re-enacts the death scene using the handcuffs, the tape, and a plastic bag. She tells Stemmons to wait three minutes before freeing her, but he and Nico can't bear to watch her struggle and he has to tear the bag open, afraid Bloom is actually suffocating herself. The outcome of the experiment, given what they know about her dedication to her cause and the fact she had only a short time to live anyway, is their conclusion that there was no murder: Constance Harraway committed suicide, deliberately intending to make it look like murder of her by Gale, because of his ruined reputation after the affair with the girl Berlin. She had willingly made love to Gale in the hours before killing herself, setting him up for the additional charge of rape. They then realize that, having been given the brief tape, there must exist a full recording of the suicide, and that Harraway's purpose was almost certainly to have Gale exculpated at the last possible moment by production of the recording that must prove she committed suicide unaided. However, whoever was supposed to produce the tape has not done so. They realize that this must be Dusty Wright, and that he has an agenda of his own. Jealous of Gale's relationship with Harraway, he has not produced the full tape recording because if saving Gale at the last minute would make news as a momentous case against the death penalty, allowing Gale to die before revealing that he was innocent would make the case even more strongly. At the last minute, they go to Wright's home and Bloom searches frantically for the full tape, while Stemmons keeps watch for any sign of Wright. She finds the tape, having to play it through and watch it to see that it is what she needs. After Hallaway dies, Dusty Wright appears in front of the camera, showing that he helped the woman in her plot against Gale. There is then a frantic journey to the prison, to try to get there and have the tape seen before Gale is executed. The car breaks down some distance away and the final scenes are of Bloom frantically running along the street trying to reach the prison before the deadline. We see the ritual leading to the execution being followed. There are calls from the state Governor's office giving final go-ahead. Outside the prison, we see a large group of demonstrators from Death Watch, part of a large crowd including police officers. Bloom reaches the crowd and makes her way through the throng only to hear an announcement from a prison official that Gale had died some minutes earlier. Back at her desk at work, Bitsy Bloom receives a Fedex package containing the favorite soft toy of Gale's young son Jamie, left behind with the father when the son went abroad. Inside it is a video cassette with an additional segment at the end revealing that Gale was in the kitchen when Hallaway committed suicide. In this way Gale wanted to relieve the journalist from the guilt of not saving him. Meanwhile Dusty Wright, very smartly dressed now, travels to Europe and delivers the silver attaché case full of cash as well as a postcard proving his innocence in his earlier alleged rape to the new residence of Sharon Gale. He rings the apartment doorbell and disappears, leaving the case anonymously at front of the door.

World War II, Sgt. Joe Enders (Nicolas Cage) rallies to return to active duty with the aid of his pharmacist Rita (Frances O'Connor) after previously surviving a gruesome battle against the Imperial Japanese Army that killed his entire squad and left him almost deaf from a Japanese grenade explosion. Enders has a perforated ear drum, and his vertical equilibrium was out of whack. He could barely even stand straight without falling down and was advised to stay at the naval base hospital for the rest of his life. While Enders gets his balance back, Rita helps him pass his hearing ability test to be restored back to active duty. Enders' new assignment is to protect Navajo code talker Pvt. Ben Yahzee (Adam Beach), which earns him the rank of sergeant. Sgt. Ox Anderson (Christian Slater) also receives a parallel assignment protecting Navajo code talker Pvt. Charlie Whitehorse (Roger Willie). Yahzee and Charlie are Native Americans who have been inducted into the army due to their ability to talk in code, which cannot be deciphered by the enemy, giving the US a crucial advantage in battle. The natives were given crash courses in the operation of radio equipment, the code itself and the ability to transmit and receive code under enemy fire. Yahzee and Whitehorse, both lifelong friends from the same Navajo tribe, are trained to send and receive coded messages that direct battleship bombardments of Japanese entrenched positions. Enders and Anderson are told by Major Mellitz (Jason Isaacs) that the code cannot fall into enemy hands, implying that they are to kill their code talkers if capture is imminent. Mellitz is clear that the mission is to protect the code first and foremost. Both Enders and Henderson resent their new assignments, and the Navajos also endure racial harassment by some of the white Marines, notably Private First Class Charles "Chick" Clusters (Noah Emmerich), a BAR gunner. Enders makes it a point not to get too friendly with Yahzee and Charlie. Yahzee tells Enders that it is his war too and he is fighting for his people. During their missions, however, Henderson and Whitehorse discover a mutual love of music. Enders and Yahzee also find that they have much in common, notably their Catholic upbringings. The orders are for the company to attack the Island of Saipan, which needs to be converted into a base for a further invasion of Japan. Saipan will be used as an advanced Naval base and an airstrip to land and refuel B-29's, and to get the bombers within range of Tokyo. Saipan is protected by 30,000 Japanese soldiers. The invasion of Saipan on June 16th, 1944 is Yahzee and Whitehorse's first combat experience. After the beachhead is secured post a bloody battle in which Yahzee is exposed to the horrors of war, the Marines come under friendly fire from American artillery. Yahzee's radio is destroyed, and the convoy is unable to call off the bombardment. Without the ability to communicate and American artillery shells raining down on them, Yahzee disguises himself as an Imperial Japanese soldier and slips behind enemy lines taking Enders as his prisoner of war in search of a radio. Enders eliminates several Japanese soldiers and Yahzee is forced to kill for the first time, slaying a Japanese radioman before he can redirect American artillery fire onto the Japanese position. For their bravery, Enders is awarded a Silver Star by the commanding officer, with Yahzee's role almost ignored until Enders points him out. That night, the Marines camp in the nearby village of Tanapag. Yahzee is sent back to headquarters and that night the Marines make camp in a village thought to be secured. Later the next morning, Japanese soldiers ambush the camp. During the fight Anderson is decapitated, and his code talker Pvt. Whitehorse is about to be captured by the Japanese. Enders sees Whitehorse being beaten and dragged away by the Japanese and tries to shoot the captors with his side arm, but it has run out of ammunition. Enders primes a grenade as Whitehorse nods to him, allowing Enders to throw the grenade at him in order to protect the code, and the ensuing explosion kills both Whitehorse and the Japanese captors. Yahzee returns to the front-line and soon learns that Enders killed Whitehorse. When Enders mutters that he killed Whitehorse, an outraged Yahzee aims his weapon at Enders but cannot bring himself to kill him. Enders later confesses that he hated having to kill Whitehorse and that, like Henderson, his mission was to protect the code above all else. Soon after, the Marines are mobilized on another mission. But they are yet again ambushed, this time near a deadly minefield. Barely able to fight their way out of the kill zone and take cover on an old battle torn ridge, the Marines see Japanese artillery fire coming on top of the same ridge which is decimating American troops below their position. Still enraged over the death of Whitehorse, Yahzee charges the Japanese line fearlessly, and in so doing, fumbles the radio needed to call in bombardments. Yahzee and Enders attempt to retrieve the radio. Yahzee and Enders are both shot as they call in an airstrike on the Japanese artillery. However, surrounded and knowing the Japanese will capture and torture him for the code as they almost did with Whitehorse, Yahzee begs Enders to kill him. Enders is determined that no one else will die that day. Enders manages to carry Yahzee to safety after taking a shot in the chest. Friendly planes arrive and the Japanese position is successfully destroyed. Yahzee rejoices in their success though Enders, mortally wounded, dies. Back in the U.S., Yahzee, his wife, and his son sit on atop of Point Mesa in Monument Valley, Arizona, and perform the Navajo ritual of paying respects to the man who saved his life. An epilogue states that the Navajo code was crucial to America's successes against Japan across the Pacific theater during the war and that like all other Native American codes, the Navajo code was never broken.

John Laroche (Chris Cooper) and his wife run a successful Florida nursery, but tragedy strikes and Laroche's wife, mother and uncle are involved in a car accident. Laroche's mother and uncle are killed immediately, but his wife goes into a coma, divorcing Laroche and suing him once she regains consciousness. Laroche even lost most of his front teeth in the accident. One month later, Laroche's home and everything he owns is destroyed by Hurricane Andrew. Meanwhile, local Seminoles hire Laroche due to his vast knowledge of flowers and orchid poaching. The Seminole are a Native American people who developed in Florida in the 18th century. However, the Seminoles only use the extract of the Ghost Orchid for illicit drug use, and not for tribal ceremonials as Laroche thought. Laroche had to go deep into the state preserve park, and traverse the swamps, to find the right kind of Orchids. Laroche is caught at the Fakahatchee Strand Preserve State Park and admits that he removed 130 plants from the reserve and most of them are endangered Orchids. Laroche argues with the Park Ranger Tony (Jim Beaver) that the Native Americans are exempt from preservation laws at the reserve. The ensuing trial captures the attention of New Yorker journalist Susan Orlean (Meryl Streep). Susan had researched the topic and knew that many explorers had perished in the jungles in search for exotic Orchids. Susan listens to Laroche's testimony and finds that Laroche is a leading expert on the topic of Orchids. Laroche says that he is the only one in the world who knows how to cultivate a Ghost Orchid. Laroche knew that so long as he did not touch the plant, the state of Florida did not have a case against him. His plan was to make the Orchid easily available in stores, so the poaching of the Preserve could stop. Laroche says that each Orchid has a special relationship with an insect that pollinates it. Laroche and Susan become great friends, with Susan writing The Orchid Thief. Laroche and Susan then become romantically involved, while Susan is still married, albeit unhappily, in New York. The Orchid Thief is then optioned by Columbia Pictures. The self-loathing and agoraphobic Charlie Kaufman (Nicholas Cage) is hired to write the screenplay for The Orchid Thief. Charlie meets Valerie Thomas (Tilda Swinton) for a business meeting Valerie represents Columbia Pictures. Charlie tells Valerie that he does not want to force a plot or a narrative on the movie, and wants to allow it to develop naturally. Valerie says that the studio likes the idea of Orlean and Laroche falling in love. Charlie is going through melancholic depression and is not happy that his twin brother Donald has moved into his house and is mooching off him. Charlie continually imagines what activities would make him happier but is unable to reach a conclusion as he procrastinates about everything. Charlie's mind wanders into all directions at once and as such he is in a constant state of paralysis, always thinking, but not really doing anything about it. He believes that all his anxieties could be a result of chemical imbalances within his body or misfiring Synapses. Charlie was the screenwriter for "Being John Malkovich", but he was ignored on sets. Charlie feels depressed that he is 40 years old, and nobody even knows his name. Donald decides to become a screenwriter like Charlie and attends Robert McKee's famous seminars. Charlie says that anyone pretending to have the answer to everyone's problems would only attract the most desperate of the lot in society. Charlie is anyways nervous as nobody has ever written a movie about flowers till date. Charlie considers this his journey into the unknown world of self-discovery. Charlie occasionally meets his ex-girlfriend Amelia who says that it is a good thing that Charlie picked the Orchid script as he needs work to focus his thoughts. Charlie, who rejects simplistic formulaic script writing, wants to ensure that his script is a faithful adaptation of The Orchid Thief. However, he comes to realize that there is no narrative to the book and that it is impossible to turn into a film, leaving Charlie with a serious case of writer's block. Meanwhile, Donald's script for a cliched psychological thriller, called The 3, sells for six or seven figures, while Charlie accidentally starts writing his script with self-reference. Already well over his deadline with Columbia Pictures, Charlie visits Susan (Meryl Streep) in New York for advice on the screenplay. Unable to face her, Charlie visits McKee's seminar in New York and asks him for advice and then brings Donald to New York to assist with the story structure. Donald pretends to be Charlie and interviews Susan but is suspicious of her account of events because it is too perfect. He and Charlie follow Orlean to Florida, where she meets John Laroche, the orchid-stealing protagonist of her book and her secret lover. It is revealed that the Seminole wanted the ghost orchid to manufacture a mind-altering drug that causes fascination. Laroche introduces the drug to Orlean. After Laroche and Orlean catch Charlie observing them taking the drug and having sex, Orlean decides that Charlie must be killed to prevent him from potentially exposing them. She forces him at gunpoint to drive to the swamp where she will kill him. Charlie and Donald escape and hide in the swamp where they resolve their differences and Charlie's problems with women. Then, Laroche accidentally shoots Donald. Fleeing, Charlie and Donald drive off but crash into a ranger's truck. Donald is ejected through the windshield and dies moments later, but Charlie is saved by the airbag and runs into the swamp to hide. There he is spotted by Laroche, who is killed by an alligator before he can kill Charlie. Susan is arrested. Charlie then makes up with his mother, tells his former love interest, Amelia (Cara Seymour), that he is still in love with her, and finishes the script. She responds that she loves him too. It ends with Charlie in a voice-over announcing the script is finished and that he wants Gérard Depardieu to portray him in the film.

Old bitter miser Ebenezer Scrooge (Simon Callow) who makes excuses for his uncaring nature learns real compassion when three ghosts visit him on Christmas Eve. This movie begins with a live-action sequence set in Boston in 1857, the site of a live reading by renowned novelist Dickens (Simon Callow). As he begins his "story of ghosts", a woman in the audience screams because she has seen a mouse, and Dickens points out that this is appropriate since his story begins with a mouse. At this point, the story turns into the animated version, and Dickens explains that the mouse, named Gabriel, carries a glimmer of hope amidst the glaring co-existence of rich and poor in the streets of London. Throughout the subsequent unfolding of the well-known story Gabriel acts as a miniature Greek chorus, providing younger members of the audience with a point of entry into the story and, in the case of the potentially frightening elements (the Ghosts of Past (Jane Horrocks), Present (Sir Michael Gambon), and Future), a place of refuge.

Cage starts as Captain Antonio Corelli, an Italian officer whose company of soldiers is sent to Cephallonia, a beautiful Greek island untouched by war. A free spirit with a passion for music and romance, Corelli is enchanted by Cephallonia and its people -- especially Pelagia (Cruz), the gorgeous, proud daughter of the island's doctor (John Hurt). Engaged to a local fisherman (Christian Bale), Pelagia resists Corelli's attentions, but the kind and charming captain weakens for her defenses. Surrendering their hearts, Corelli and Pelagia begin a heated affair. But before their love can grow, the war crashes on Cephallonia's shores, forcing Corelli and Pelagia to make dangerous sacrifices for country and homeand risk losing each other forever.

In Los Angeles, Seth (Nicolas Cage) is one of many angels who watch over humans and protect them in unseen ways. Seth's main responsibility is to appear to those who are close to death and guide them to the next life. As part of this task, Seth and one of his fellow angels, Cassiel (Andre Braugher), like to ask people what their favorite thing in life was. But despite their daily encounters, they appear to have trouble understanding human beings and their ways. While waiting to escort to the other world a man who will not survive heart surgery, Seth is impressed by the vigorous efforts of the surgeon, Maggie Rice (Meg Ryan), to save the ill-fated man's life and her sincere anguish at her failure to do so. Seth soon becomes preoccupied with Maggie and decides to become visible to her despite his obvious inability to give her many convincing details about himself, such as what he does for a living or even his last name. Despite this, they develop a friendship which soon turns to mutual attraction, although Maggie is already involved with one of her colleagues, Jordan Ferris (Colm Feore), at the hospital. Seth then meets Nathaniel Messinger (Dennis Franz), one of Maggie's patients, who can sense Seth's presence and that of other angels. Nathaniel soon relates to Seth that he, too, had once been an angel but, by way of the free will granted to angels, decided to become human through the process he refers to as "falling". Seth begins to consider exercising this option so that he can be with Maggie in a fully physical and emotional relationship. When Maggie receives a marriage proposal from Jordan, she finds herself having to choose between him and Seth. Having realized that Seth is impervious to injury, Maggie finally confronts him and demands to know who or what he really is, but she is unable to accept the revelation and sends him away. Maggie later talks about Seth with Nathaniel who gradually reveals his own angelic origin. He explains to her why he himself chose to become human and points out that Seth is thinking of doing the same. Seth decides to become human through the symbolic gesture of jumping from the top of a skyscraper. Immediately upon awakening from the jump, he starts to experience all of the human feelings and sensations that he had never been able to understand, beginning with physical injury and pain. Up until this point, Seth's personality and emotions, like those of all the other angels, have been very subdued, but that starts to change. Now human, Seth has to find his way to the hospital to see Maggie, but he is told that she has gone to her uncle's mountain cabin for a break. Penniless and naive, he cannot pay for the journey and ends up getting mugged and having his boots taken from his feet by a gang of roving predators. He eventually hitches a ride to Lake Tahoe and appears, soaked and cold, at Maggie's doorstep. Seeing the split lip and condensed breath coming from his mouth in the cold air, Maggie realizes that he has given up his exalted status for her love. She sees to his wounds and then they enjoy warm, passionate lovemaking at last. The next morning, as Seth is in the shower, enjoying his first sensation of running hot water on his body, Maggie rides her bike to a local store to buy some pears for him. On her way back, happy and fulfilled, she rides her bike with her eyes closed and her arms wide open to the Autumn sunlight and her bright future with Seth. Her happiness is cut short by a truck that catches her by surprise when it pulls out in front of her. Seth senses that Maggie is in trouble and runs to her aid. He arrives in time for Maggie to tell him that she sees the angel who has come to escort her away. Although Seth is no longer able to see the angels, he knows they are there and begs Maggie not to look at them. Maggie tells him that she is not afraid anymore and that when they will ask her what her favorite thing in life used to be, she will say it was Seth. Now grieving and alone, Seth is visited by his former colleague and friend, the angel Cassiel. Cassiel offers comfort and asks Seth if he knew this would happen, would he still decide to become human. Seth answers: " I would rather have had one breath of her hair, one kiss of her mouth, one touch of her hand, than eternity without it. One. " Seth mourns for Maggie and begins a difficult adjustment to his new life. The final scene recalls an earlier one with Nathaniel. It shows Seth at the beach where the angels meet every day at dawn to listen to the celestial music. With Cassiel and the rest of the angels watching, Seth expresses his joy in being human and the fact that he has come to terms with his new life by running into the water and playing in the waves. In a rare moment of emotion, Cassiel is seen laughing joyfully for his old friend.

Ben Sanderson (Cage) is a Hollywood agent who has lost everything because of his alcoholism. He loses his job, his family, and decides to commit suicide by alcohol consumption in Las Vegas. After arriving, he meets Sera (Shue), a prostitute, and a deep friendship and understanding develops between them. The movie begins with Ben 'first' shopping for beer, then, in a restaurant. He borrows some money from his colleague Peter (Richard Lewis), and then proceeds directly to a bar and starts drinking. He attempts to pick up a pretty girl (Valeria Golino) and fails. After leaving the bar he visits a prostitute, and succeeds only in getting his wedding ring stolen. He is fired from his job for alcohol related issues and is given a large severance package. When his boss asks him what he is going to do next, Ben responds "I thought I'd move out to Las Vegas". He goes home and starts emptying his house by stuffing bedding in garbage bags, and creating a bonfire in his backyard on which he burns photographs, clothes, passport and other possessions. He then leaves for Las Vegas. As he drives his BMW drunkenly down the Las Vegas Strip, he almost hits a woman in the crosswalk (who turns out to be Sera) who chastises him. Ben checks himself into a sleazy motel called The Whole Year Inn. However, as he looks at this the wording changes to "The Hole You're In". Sera (Elisabeth Shue) is a Las Vegas prostitute who works for a pimp, Yuri Butso (Julian Sands), a Latvian immigrant. Yuri and Sera "share a volatile relationship where Yuri is the dominator and Sera is the masochist."[2] Polish mobsters are after Yuri for an unknown matter; therefore, Yuri breaks his relationship with Sera in fear that the Poles may hurt her. It frees Sera to continue to build her relationship with Ben. On his second day in Las Vegas, Ben finds Sera, on the same street where he met her, introduces himself and offers her $500 to go to his room for an hour. Sera agrees to go to his room, but she gets confused when Ben does not want to have sex with her. Instead, they just talk, and in the process they create an odd relationship with each other. Their relationship, however, is ultimately doomed; Sera has to promise Ben that she will never ask him to stop drinking, and Ben is not allowed to criticize Sera's occupation. At first the two are generally stable. Ben states that he is "totally at ease with this (Sera's prostitution)." However, after spending some time together, they both become more and more frustrated with the other's behavior. Over time, Sera attempts to get Ben to eat healthily but Ben refuses to even notice these actions as he stumbles for more alcohol. Finally, Sera becomes so fed up with Ben's alcoholism that she begs him to see a doctor. Ben, furious but far too intoxicated to express his feelings, goes out and brings another prostitute (played by Mariska Hargitay) back to Sera's house. Sera returns home to find them together and throws Ben out. Shortly afterwards, she is raped and beaten by three teenagers, and the injuries she sustains make her occupation publicly obvious. After being evicted, Sera receives a telephone call from Ben, who is on his deathbed. She goes to visit Ben and they have sex. They fall asleep, and when Ben wakes up, he looks across at Sera, who is lying on top of him, and dies while holding her as she sleeps.

Policeman Charlie Lang (Nicolas Cage) is a kind and generous man who loves his job and the Queens borough of New York City where he lives. Bo (Wendell Pierce) is Charlie's partner and together they work to maintain the peace in their neighborhood. Charlie is a good listener and loved kids. Charlie only wanted to help the community and never shied away from helping where he could (helping a blind man cross the street, teaching kids how to play baseball, catching petty thieves, delivering a baby on the public bus and so on) His wife Muriel (Rosie Perez) works in a hairdressing salon and, unlike Charlie, is selfish, greedy and materialistic, constantly complaining about their situation in life. Muriel hated Queens. Waitress Yvonne Biasi (Bridget Fonda) is bankrupt because her husband Eddie (Stanley Tucci), whom she could not yet afford to divorce, emptied their joint checking account and spent all the money without her permission, while also leaving her with a credit card debt of over $12,000. The court holds her responsible for the entire bill; moreover, Yvonne's boss docks her pay for the time she spent in court, even though Yvonne gave ample notice. Charlie meets Yvonne when she waits on him at the diner where she works. Since Charlie has cash to cover the bill but doesn't have enough money to pay the tip. So, he promises to give her either double the tip or half of his prospective lottery winnings the next day. Yvonne is sure that she will never see Charlie again in her life. Charlie wins a $4 million share of $64 million (in 21 annual payments) in the lottery the next day (as 16 other people picked the same numbers) and keeps his promise, despite the protests of his wife. Muriel sees this as an opportunity to become a spokesperson for her favorite beauty products. Muriel asks Charlie to do the right thing for them, but he is adamant that he gave Yvonne his word. Charlie returns to the diner and asks Yvonne to choose if she wants double the tip or half of the lottery (without telling her that he won the lottery). Yvonne goes for the split of the lottery and Charlie reveals that it is $4 million. Yvonne believes that Charlie is making fun of her string of bad luck, but he convinces her that they won $4 million in the New York State Lottery. For Charlie, a promise is a promise. Charlie and Yvonne become stars almost immediately. Yvonne buys the diner she was working in and promptly fires her ex-boss. She sets up a table with Charlie's name at which people who cannot afford food can eat for free. In another development, Charlie becomes a hero for foiling an attempted robbery at a grocery store but gets wounded in the process. Following a commendation, he takes mandatory leave from the NYPD. At a gathering on a chartered boat for the lottery winners and other members of high society, Muriel gets to know the newly rich Jack Gross (Seymour Cassel). She flirts with him and develops a strong liking for him, which is mutual. Both Yvonne and Charlie miss the cruise because he had to go and make change for her taxi driver and bond over dinner. Meanwhile, Charlie and Yvonne spend a lot of time together, on one occasion paying for the train journeys of passengers of the subway, and on another treating the children of his neighborhood to a day out at Yankee Stadium, about which there is a media report. Muriel gets fed up with Charlie's constant donations and overall simplicity and throws him out of their apartment, asking for a divorce. That same evening, Yvonne leaves her apartment after her husband shows up and threatens to stay until he gets $50,000 from her. Quite innocently, Charlie and Yvonne run into each other at the Plaza Hotel and, unintentionally, end up spending the night together. During divorce proceedings between Muriel and Charlie, Muriel demands all the money that Charlie won for herself. Charlie doesn't mind giving his share of the money but Muriel also wants the money he gave Yvonne, and Charlie's steadfast unwillingness to do so causes Muriel to take the case to court. The jury decides in her favor. Yvonne, feeling guilty at costing Charlie all his money, runs out of court in tears and tries to keep away from him. But the cop, by now hopelessly in love with the waitress, finds her at the diner and tells her that the money means nothing to him, and they declare their love for each other. While ruminating about their future at the diner and considering a possible move to Buffalo, they are gracious enough to provide a hungry and poor customer some soup, which he eats at the Charlie Lang Table. The poor customer is none other than the disguised undercover photojournalist Angel Dupree (Isaac Hayes), who takes photos of the couple and in the next day's newspapers publicly eulogies their willingness to feed a hungry and poor man even in their darkest hour. Just as Charlie and Yvonne are moving out of town, the citizens of New York City, no doubt touched by the generosity of the couple, send "the cop and the waitress" thousands of letters with tips totaling over $600,000, enough to help pay their debts. After Muriel gets remarried, her new husband Jack Gross flees the country with all the money from their checking account, revealing himself to be a con man. She then has no option but to move in with her mother in the Bronx and go back to her old manicure job. Eddie Biasi, now divorced from Yvonne, ends up becoming a taxi driver. Charlie happily returns to the police force and Yvonne reclaims the diner. At the film's end, Charlie and Yvonne get married and begin their honeymoon by taking off from Central Park in a hot air balloon that bears the New York Post headline "Cop Weds Waitress".

A former U.S. First Lady wants a particular Secret Service agent to head her bodyguard detail, even though he can't stand her. Doug is a Secret Service Agent who has just completed his stint in charge protecting Tess Carlisle, widow of a former U.S. President, and close personal friend of the President. He finds that she has requested that he not be rotated but instead return to be her permanent detail. Doug is crushed. He wants off her detail. She is very difficult to guard and makes her detail crazy with her whims and demands. Doug returns with no idea of how to continue dealing with her. —John Vogel <jlvogel@comcast.net> After serving three years as the Secret Service Agent in charge of protecting the unbearable widow and former First Lady Tess Carlisle, Doug Chesnic is relieved to return to Washington. However, she asks to her friend, the President of the United States, that Doug stays as her bodyguard for unlimited time. Doug and his team are forced to return to protect Mrs. Carlisle, who wants to impose her whims to Doug, like leaving the guarding team alone with her driver Earl or playing golf in a very cold day. Tess has also an incurable brain tumor that nobody knows. One day, she invites Doug to go to a picnic with her and out of the blue, she is abducted with Earl. The CIA and the FBI arrive to investigate and find her car, Earl doped and a ransom message in the glove compartment requesting US 15 million. Doug and his men feel how much they like Tess and Doug takes an ultimate decision to find her. —Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

A New Yorker heads to California to find the look-alike brother of his conman dad. After he accidentally kills his father, Mike, during a sting, Joe tries to carry out Mike's dying wish by recovering valuables that Mike's twin brother Lou stole from him years earlier. But Uncle Lou is also a confidence artist, and Joe is soon drawn into his increasingly dangerous schemes. —Marg Baskin <marg@asd.raytheon.ca>

In 1985, Jack Singer (Nicholas Cage) swears to his overbearing and possessive mother, Bea (Anne Bancroft), while she is on her deathbed, that he would never get married because Bea is the only woman who will ever love Jack. Over the next seven years, Jack, who works as a New York private detective that handles divorce cases, begins dating Betsy (Sarah Jessica Parker), an elementary school teacher, but is reluctant to commit. By the present day in 1992, Betsy finally tires of Jack's reluctance and threatens to leave him. Fearful of losing her, Jack suggests a spontaneous trip to get married in Las Vegas, Nevada. They check into the Bally's Hotel during a convention of Elvis Presley impersonators. Before the wedding, however, a high-stakes gambler named Tommy Korman (James Caan) sees Betsy from a distance in the hotel lobby and notices a striking resemblance to his beloved late wife Donna. Tommy, an eternal and ruthless romantic, determines to romance Betsy and marry her. Jack is very nervous about getting married and decides to relax by gambling first. Tommy lures him into a high-stakes poker game. Up in Tommy's hotel suite, he arranges a crooked poker game (with Jerry Tarkanian as one of the other players) where Jack borrows $65,000 after being dealt a straight flush (7-8-9-10-Jack of clubs), only to lose to the gambler's higher straight flush (8-9-10-Jack-Queen of hearts); Tommy, however, promises to erase the debt with a proposal: Tommy offers to accept a platonic weekend with Betsy as payment for the debt, and Jack reluctantly agrees. Betsy is furious when Jack tells her about his predicament, but Tommy charms her and she agrees to the arrangement. Tommy Korman meets Betsy for drinks and reveals they will be spending the weekend at his beachfront estate in Kauai, Hawaii. As Betsy packs for the trip, Jack realizes the magnitude of his mistake, and asks her to marry him immediately. However, Betsy does not believe his proposal is sincere, or he would have married her upon their arrival in Vegas. She plans to honor the deal with Tommy, and informs Jack that they will return from Hawaii mid-week. Tommy flies with Betsy to his estate, where she meets his family and is impressed by his thoughtfulness. Upset, Jack returns home to New York to wait. One of Jack's clients, an emotionally erratic man named Sydney Tomashefsky (Robert Costanzo) tells Jack about his crazy suspicions about his wife cheating on him with boxer Mike Tyson. Meanwhile, Tommy continues to court Betsy at his island paradise house, trying to woo her to replace his late wife whom he confides in her about. Jack becomes more agitated when he sees a television news story about a volcano erupting in Hawaii, and spots Betsy and Tommy among the excited onlookers. Jack flies to Hawaii, but his efforts to see Betsy are thwarted by Tommy's men. When Tommy learns that Jack has left New York and is heading to Hawaii to try to get Betsy back, the gambler hires a local taxi driver friend, named Mahi Mahi (Pat Morita) to keep Jack as far away as possible from him and Betsy until he manages to persuade her to marry him. When Jack arrives on Kauai, Mahi Mahi intercepts him and takes Jack on an aimless drive around the island, leading them to an old Hawaiian chief's house who is Chief Orman (Peter Boyle), where Mahi Mahi tries to stall Jack. At the same time, Tommy begins feeding Betsy lies about Jack, first claiming that Jack lied to her about the gambling bet by claiming that Jack only lost $3,000 instead of $65,000 and that Jack has used Betsy as collateral, which makes Betsy feel more hurt and betrayed. He tries to calm her down by proposing marriage. Believing Tommy's lies, Betsy accepts his proposal. He insists they return to Las Vegas and get married immediately. At Chief Orman's house, Jack eventually figures out that Mahi Mahi must be on Tommy's payroll, so he distracts Mahi Mahi for a minute where Jack steals the taxi and drives off looking for Tommy and Betsy. After learning from Tommy's son and wife that Tommy hangs out at the Kauai Club, Jack drives over there that evening, and sees Betsy outside the club. But before Jack can approach her, he is attacked by Tommy and arrested. Jack calls his bookie dentist friend Dr. Molar (John Capodice) in New York who pays for Jack's $5,000 bail. Mahi Mahi meets him outside and admits that Tommy Korman left for Vegas with Betsy and has convinced her to marry him. Mahi races Jack to the airport. As Betsy and Tommy arrive back in Las Vegas, she tries to contact Jack to inform him about her choice, but cannot reach him anywhere. This slowly leads her to have second thoughts about marrying Tommy. Meanwhile, Jack cannot get a connecting flight to Las Vegas and ends up in San Jose, California where another one of Tommy's employees (a ticket agent) tries to stall Jack again from getting a flight to Las Vegas. Jack tries frantically to find a flight to Vegas. Finally, he finds a group about to depart for Vegas, but, much to his surprise, finds out mid-flight that they are the Utah chapter of the "Flying Elvises" - a skydiving team of Elvis impersonators led by the flamboyant Roy Bacon (Burton Gillam). Jack now realizes that he will have to skydive from 3,000 feet in order to get to Betsy. Back in Las Vegas, Tommy tries to rush Betsy to a wedding chapel, but she hesitates and asks to wait a few weeks. Tommy, sensing that he is losing control of the situation, offers her $1 million to marry him right away. She is disgusted by the offer and starts to leave. However, Tommy snaps and threatens that she agreed to the marriage... and no one breaks their word to him. Intimidated (and finally seeing the gangster that Tommy really is), Betsy asks to use the ladies room before leaving for the wedding chapel. As Tommy waits, Betsy follows several showgirls to their dressing area, dons a showgirl's costume, and sneaks out of the hotel. As Tommy and his men search for Betsy, she hides among the crowds lining the street to see the arrival of The Flying Elvises. Although Jack is afraid of dying, his love for Betsy overcomes his fear, and he jumps out of the plane with the other skydivers. Betsy hears Jack's name announced as he lands, and she runs into his arms. He declares his love, and asks her to marry him. From a short distance away, Tommy sees the couple together and realizes he has lost Betsy. Tommy tells his henchmen to let Jack and Betsy go and then heads back inside the hotel to his suite to set up another poker game with some of the guests. (Note: even though Tommy is the villain of this film, one can't help it but feel a tiny bit sorry for him.) The final scene shows Jack and Betsy getting married in a small Las Vegas chapel with the Flying Elvises as guests, Jack still in his white illuminated jumpsuit and Betsy in her stolen showgirl outfit.

Sailor and Lula run away to start a new life, pursued by hitmen hired by Lula`s vengeful mother.

Thirty-seven-year-old Loretta Castorini (Cher), a Sicilian-American widow, is an accountant in Brooklyn Heights, New York, where she lives with her family: her father Cosmo (Vincent Gardenia) who is a successful plumber, her mother Rose (Olympia Dukakis), and her paternal grandfather (Feodor Chaliapin, Jr). Her boyfriend, Johnny Cammareri (Danny Aiello) proposes to her before leaving for Sicily to attend to his dying mother; she accepts, but is insistent that they carefully follow tradition as she believes her first marriage was cursed by her failure to do so, resulting in her husband's death when he was hit by a bus. They plan to marry one month later, and Johnny asks Loretta to invite his estranged younger brother Ronny (Nicolas Cage) to the wedding. Loretta returns home and informs her parents of the engagement. Cosmo dislikes Johnny and is reluctant to commit to paying for the "real" wedding Loretta insists on, while Rose is pleased that Loretta likes Johnny but does not love him; she believes that one can easily be driven crazy by a partner whom one loves. The next day, Loretta goes to see Ronny at his bakery after he refuses to speak to her on the phone. He reveals that he has a wooden prosthetic hand, and he explains that he blames Johnny for the loss of his hand and his own fiancée; Ronny became distracted while talking to Johnny as he cut bread for him, his hand was mangled in the slicer, and his fiancée left him. Loretta insists that they discuss the matter upstairs in his apartment, where she cooks for him and then tells him that she believes he is a "wolf" who cut off his own hand to escape the trap of a bad relationship. Ronny reacts furiously and passionately, kissing Loretta (who responds to his kiss) and then sweeping her up in his arms and carrying her to his bed where they make love. That evening, Rose's brother Raymond (Louis Guss) and his wife Rita (Julie Bovasso) join Rose and Cosmo for dinner, and they all wonder where Loretta is. Raymond recalls that when he was a boy and Cosmo was courting Rose, he thought that a particularly bright moon one night was somehow brought to the house by Cosmo because of his love for Rose. That night, Loretta remains at Ronny's apartment and sees such a moon; Raymond sees it as well, and it leads him and Rita to make love. The next morning, Loretta tells Ronny they can never see each other again. She slaps him when he claims to be in love with her ("Snap out of it!) and he agrees to never see her again if she will attend the opera (his other great love) with him that night. She agrees. After closing out the cash register in Raymond and Rita's store, Loretta impulsively has some long-neglected beauty treatments, including having the gray removed from her hair, and buys a glamorous evening gown. She then goes to church and confesses her infidelity. She unexpectedly sees her mother there, and Rose tells her that Cosmo is having an affair; Loretta is doubtful, but Cosmo is in fact dining with his mistress Mona (Anita Gillette) at that moment and giving her jewelry. Loretta and Ronny (wearing a tuxedo) meet at Lincoln Center, and each is impressed with the other's appearance. Loretta is deeply moved by her first opera, Puccini's La bohème. But as they leave, Loretta sees Cosmo and Mona, and she confronts her father. He sees that she is with Ronny, and he suggests that they simply agree that they didn't see each other at all, but Loretta is conflicted. Loretta then intends to return home alone, but Ronny leads her back to his apartment where he passionately and desperately persuades her into another tryst. The same night, Rose dines alone at a restaurant and sees a college professor, Perry (John Mahoney), being dramatically dumped by a female student, a similar scene having played out with a different girl the night Johnny proposed to Loretta. Rose invites Perry to dine with her, asks him why men pursue women, and then shares with him her belief that men pursue women because they fear death. Perry walks Rose home and tries to convince her to invite him in; she refuses, citing the fact that she knows herself. Later, Johnny unexpectedly returns from Sicily after his mother's "miraculous" recovery and goes to Loretta's house; Rose explains that she's not there and then asks him why men chase women. He tells her it may be because they fear death, and Rose realizes, as she had suspected before, that he is right. After this exchange he leaves, planning to return in the morning to see Loretta. In the morning, Loretta returns home in a reverie but is then distressed to learn from Rose that Johnny will be there soon. Ronny then arrives, and Rose notes their matching "love bites" and invites him for breakfast over Loretta's objections. Cosmo and his father emerge from upstairs, and the older man cajoles Cosmo into agreeing to pay for Loretta's wedding. Rose then confronts Cosmo and, after he acknowledges in response to her questioning that she has been a good wife, demands that he end his affair; he is upset but agrees and, after insistence from Rose, also agrees to go to confession, and they then affirm their love for each other. Raymond and Rita also arrive, concerned and seemingly reluctantly suspicious, to find out why Loretta didn't make the previous day's bank deposit; they are relieved to learn that she merely forgot and still has the money. When Johnny finally arrives, he breaks off the engagement, superstitiously believing that their marriage would cause his mother's death. Loretta, momentarily offended by his breaking the engagement, chastises Johnny for breaking his promise and throws the engagement ring at him. Seizing the moment, Ronny borrows the ring and asks Loretta to marry him; she accepts. To Rose's chagrin, Loretta declares that she loves Ronny. The family toasts the couple with champagne and a befuddled Johnny joins in at the grandfather's urging, as he will now be part of the family after all.

Peggy Sue, on the verge of a divorce, faints at her 25th high school reunion, and wakes up to find herself back in 1960, leading her to try to spot and correct the mistakes that led to disappointments and an unhappy marriage. Peggy Sue Bodell (Turner) attends her 25-year high school reunion after separating from her cheating husband, Charlie (Cage). She regrets the decisions she has made in her life, such as getting pregnant by Charlie in high school. When she faints at the reunion, she wakes up in 1960 - and is given the chance to relive her life. Peggy Sue was one of the most popular girls in high school, enjoying life with her friends and her boyfriend Charlie. It was the typical high school dream, until she finds herself married to Charlie and becoming a young mother. However, her life takes a serious turn, leaving her depressed and facing divorce when Charlie runs off with another woman. At her high school reunion, Peggy Sue faints and wakes up back in high school. Despite her confusion about what has happened and how to get back to her own time, Peggy realizes that she has a chance to start her life over, to avoid her depression and her marriage to Charlie. However, just because she knows the future, does that mean she can really avoid it? —Lex Forty-three year old Peggy Sue Bodell (née Kelcher) is in an unsatisfying marriage to her high school sweetheart, Charlie Bodell, a marriage which includes money issues and infidelity. They got married when she got pregnant at age eighteen. He still dreams about the musical career he wanted that never materialized. She feels he blames her for that failure. They are on the verge of divorce. At a pivotal moment related to her high school life, Peggy Sue mysteriously gets transported back twenty-five years to her senior year of high school. Initially, she is most concerned about what has happened to her, not knowing if what she's experiencing is real or if perhaps she's dead. But after the initial shocks of revisiting her youth, Peggy Sue thinks that she can rewrite her past and make different decisions that will affect her future, one she hopes will be happier than what she experienced the first time around. But she also learns some things about why Charlie made the decisions he did. —Huggo

A young man nicknamed Birdy (Matthew Modine) is sitting on the floor of his barren psychiatric hospital room. He seems in an almost comatose state. In another hospital, conscious U.S. Army Sergeant Alfonso 'Al' Columbato (Nicolas Cage), with his face heavily bandaged, is being wheeled on a stretcher to his dormitory styled room, where the orderlies transfer him to his bed. Later, the doctor is examining him, they talking about Al's facial injuries, when the bandages are going to be removed, and the likelihood of success of the completed reconstructive surgery. Apparently Al is leaving the hospital soon. Al is on a train, trying to find a place to sit down. He places his bag on the overhead rack and sits opposite a woman and her adolescent daughter. The girl can't help but stare at the heavily face-bandaged Al, who in turn notices her looking and feels her discomfort. To break the ice, Al says "boo" to her, and she smiles knowingly. Her mother matter-of-factly tells her not to stare. Al begins to think about his friend Birdy, who most have always thought weird. [Flashback to their high school days in South Philadelphia] In a large field sandwiched within a residential neighborhood, Al is playing in a pick-up game of softball. When he's up at bat, he hits a fly ball into the backyard of a house. He swears when he sees where it landed. The woman in the backyard picks up the ball. The kids know that the woman won't give them the ball back, she who doesn't and tells them to go play somewhere else. That woman is Birdy's mother (Dolores Sage), who has kept balls from them before. Birdy's father (George Buck), who is also working in the backyard, tells his wife to return the ball, she who refuses and walks away with ball in hand. Without another ball, the kids are forced to stop playing and they disperse. As Al begins to walk away, he sees Birdy sitting in a tree, he who looks back. They say nothing to each other. Al is making out with a girl under some bleachers. As he tries to take her clothes off, she resists, while they still kiss. Al's younger brother Mario Columbato (James Santini) comes by looking for Al. As Al tells Mario to get lost, Mario tells him that "the weird kid" is just down the street. Swearing about having to stop making out, Al goes with Mario. They end up at Birdy's house, Birdy who is sitting on the stoop of the front porch working on something with cooing pigeons in a cage next to him. Al calls him bird boy. Birdy says nothing. Al asks him if he has a knife to remove a splinter from his hand. Birdy hands over a pocket knife. Al tells Birdy the knife belongs to Mario. Birdy grabs the knife back and runs away as Al chases him. As they struggle, Birdy manages to elude Al while grabbing his cage. During the scuffle, Al learns that Birdy didn't steal the knife but got it from whoever did steal it. Al is incensed with Mario for not telling him that fact. Al lets Birdy keep the knife. Not knowing its true origins, Birdy offers the knife back to Mario. Al grabs it and hands it back to Birdy. Al tells Mario that he'll get him another knife. The athletic Al is interested in Birdy's natural wrestling ability, which he noticed during the scuffle. Birdy in turns asks if Al is interested in pigeons. Birdy's fascination with them is partly because of their ability to fly. Al becomes interested when Birdy tells him he's training them to become carrier pigeons. As Birdy walks away down the street, Al chases after him offering to help Birdy catch some pigeons. They end up at a railway overpass where some pigeons are taking off and landing. Birdy relates to Al the routinized behavior of the birds. The two boys climb up onto the frame support of the overpass, precariously over the busy traffic below. Al is nervous, but Birdy seems within his element. Birdy easily catches one of the pigeons just before a train rolls by which scares the remaining birds off to flight. Birdy and Al are shown in short succession catching more pigeons, transporting those birds in cages on their bicycles, and building a large wooden aviary. Al takes one of the birds and throws it up in the air. The pigeon flies back to the aviary. The boys are excited that the pigeon goes where they want it. Later, they release a flock of pigeons from a faraway dock. The pigeons fly back to their "home" in the aviary. Al goes to the aviary to do some work. As he goes about his work with the pigeons, he yells out for Birdy, knowing that Birdy is somewhere in the aviary. Birdy emerges covered in feathers. He is wearing a pigeon suit he made so that the pigeons will think he's one of them. Birdy wants Al to try the suit. Al doesn't want to, he who is scared to look stupid wearing a bird suit. Later that evening, Al, wearing the suit and feeling embarrassed, and Birdy, wearing another suit, are at a secured gas well site climbing to the top of the tower. Against Al's wishes, Birdy is hanging over the side collecting pigeons while Al holds his legs. Al slips, letting go of Birdy's legs. Birdy falls over the side, but manages to grab hold of the side of the tower instead of falling to the ground. A scared Al tries to get a hold of Birdy, who seems nonplussed at his predicament. Birdy sees a sand-pile below and tells Al he's going to fly down. As Al screams for Birdy not to do it, Birdy lets go. Al runs down the stairs to the sand-pile where he finds a slightly dazed Birdy, who says that he flew and it was beautiful. Al, still scared as he's unaware if Birdy is injured, hugs his friend as a police car approaches. [Forward to present day] At the hospital, Birdy is staring into space, while Al looks at him through the window in the door. Major Weiss (John Harkins), Birdy's doctor, asks for Al's assessment of Birdy. Al doesn't think he looks good and asks in return if that is all Birdy does i.e. stare into space. The doctor replies affirmatively, stating that he suffered minor physical injuries but that his main problem is something psychological. All they know is that Birdy was MIA for a month in Vietnam and when found they didn't know who he was for a while. Birdy has not spoken since he was found. Al learns that Birdy's mother was the one who suggested to the doctor to bring him here. The major hopes the visit will do both Al and Birdy some good. The major takes Al back to his office to show him photos of Birdy taken while at the hospital - they are all of Birdy in crouched positions, generally of him nude. After questioning, Al tells him that they are close and crazy friends but not queer. They talk about Al's own injuries, the casualties of the war but the fact that the military takes care of its own. The major suggests that Al go and visit with Birdy now. Renaldi (Bruno Kirby) is to be his guide. Renaldi, an orderly who does almost everything needed for the patients, takes Al to see other patients doing some physical therapy of manual hand dexterity. Renaldi ended up doing this work as a conscientious objector. As Renaldi unlocks Birdy's door, Birdy, startled and crouched on the floor, turns around. Al enters and makes some wisecracks. Birdy registers no acknowledgment. Al continues speaking about life back in South Philadelphia when they were kids, about his own injuries, and the war. Al ultimately asks him point blank what happened to him. As Al approaches, Birdy turns away. A civilian nurse named Hannah Rourke (Karen Young) enters, surprised to see Al there. As Al tells her who he is, she now remembers hearing stories of his arrival. She is the only one who Birdy will allow feed him, although this time he is not cooperating. As Hannah lets Al out of the room, Birdy turns his head to look skyward toward the window. [Flashback to their high school years] Birdy is on an examining table in the hospital, being checked for physical injuries while Al, off in the distance still wearing the pigeon suit, looks on. He tells another waiting patient that Birdy has a broken leg and perhaps a broken back, the latter which he hopes isn't the case as that can make one crazy, although Birdy is a bit crazy already. Birdy's parents are dismantling the aviary and burning the wood, while Al, reading in the newspaper of Birdy's fall, looks on, he who is more interested in the story. The pigeons that were in the aviary fly away. Al talks to a recovered Birdy about that being the end of their bird adventures, while Birdy is convinced that the pigeons will still return despite his mother having destroyed the actual structure of the aviary. Al admits that the birds did come back, but Birdy's mother poisoned some, and the others she got the local butcher to come take away for food. Birdy concedes to Al's wishes of going into a different venture together. [Forward to present day] Birdy is lying on his hospital room floor in a crucifixion position. Al, elsewhere in the hospital, is smoking and contemplating life. Later, Birdy is crouched on the floor next to the toilet, naked, staring upward. Birdy is remembering a story told by Al of a statue atop city hall that looks like it has an erection. Birdy grins slightly. [Flashback to high school years] Birdy is naked sitting on the floor of a large cage, feeling what it's like to be a caged pigeon. [Forward to present day] Birdy is still crouched in his hospital room. Shadows of birds can been seen through the window. Still, Birdy registers no acknowledgment. [Flashback to high school years] Al and Birdy are looking at a car in a junk yard, the car which they end up buying. With Al behind the steering wheel, Birdy pushes the car off the yard. As Al and Birdy work on the car, Mr. Columbato (Sandy Baron) arrives home, telling the boys the car is a piece of shit. Al curses his father under his breath. Al, behind the wheel, nervously turns the key in the ignition while Birdy, in the passenger seat, looks on. After a few sputtered attempts, the ignition rolls for a split second, to which Al and Birdy hug each other excitedly. They mockingly pretend they are off on a drive, Al speaking of driving to the ocean, to which Birdy replies that he's never been. Birdy is jumping out of the ocean waves in Atlantic City. Birdy likens the experience to flying in thick air. As Birdy dives under the water again, Al curses as he wants to party on the boardwalk instead. After several seconds, Birdy does not surface. A worried Al yells for Birdy, but can't do anything about it as Al doesn't know how to swim. Al, Birdy and their dates Shirley (Sandra Beall) and Rosanne (Elizabeth Whitcraft) are on a miniature roller coaster. Birdy is half standing up, flapping his arms like a bird. As they wander around the amusement park, Al is interested in the girls while Birdy sees them more as a distraction. They stop at the underwater merman, Birdy who wonders how he can hold his breath so long. Later, Al and Shirley are noisily having sex in the grass, while Birdy and Rosanne, nearby, make small talk. After a few seconds, Rosanne can no longer stand being with the "weird" Birdy and yanks Shirley away from the sex to head off. Birdy is nonplussed, while Al is angry. At the beach the next day, Birdy is flapping his arms like a bird jumping around, while Al yells to him that he has to learn to get along with girls in a normal way, which means no bird talk. They argue about the female form, Birdy seeing women's breasts as no more than enlarged mammary glands, whereas Al sees beauty. A policeman approaches them, asking if the 1953 Ford is their car. At the police station, Al and Birdy are behind bars waiting for Al's parents to show up. Birdy is pacing while Al is calm. The Columbatos arrive to pick up the boys. As Al gets to the car, Mr. Columbato slaps him hard across the face. Al winces and starts to cry. Birdy asks what birds looking down must think of their lives. Mr. Columbato is angry at the banter, at the boys and the fact that the car engine won't start. The four are then seen from a bird's eye view. [Forward to present day] Al is let into Birdy's hospital room, the door locked behind him. Birdy is crouched on the floor and Al sits across from him. Al starts having a conversation with himself, speaking both his and Birdy's parts. He stops the dialogue and yells at Birdy to talk to him. Al tells Birdy he knows he's finally a bird and that it's no big deal, except that he will be used as a medical case history forever. Birdy turns his head and looks out the window. It's a heavily overcast day with a glint of sunshine filtering through the clouds. [Flashback to high school years] It's a rainy day and Birdy is headed to see Mrs. Prevost (Nancy Fish) who sells birds out of her house. Birds are flying everywhere in the room. Birdy takes a liking to a yellow canary which he buys. He names her Birda. Al and Birdy are moving what looks to be a large pair of wings. They're discussing the fact that Mr. Columbato sold their car, which Birdy wants. Al tries to dissuade him from talking to Mr. Columbato as Al knows his father will beat Birdy if he makes a fuss about the car. Birdy confronts Mr. Columbato about the issue. They argue long and hard about it. Mr. Columbato, at the end of his rope, at least offers the money back to Birdy. That's not the point to Birdy, but Mrs. Columbato makes Birdy take the money. A dejected Birdy takes the money, walks away and gives the entire wad of cash to Al as Birdy doesn't want the money, just the car. [Forward to present day] Al is admiring the fact that Birdy stood up to Mr. Columbato, something Al himself could never do. Al, confused about their current life, gets up to leave but not before giving Birdy a caress on the cheek. There is no reaction from Birdy. With the door locked, Al pounds on the door and yells for Renaldi to unlock it. As Renaldi rushes to unlock the door for Al, Birdy registers some fear from the knocking. Al yells out for Birdy as he reminisces about being in the jungle in Vietnam. Al wakens from a nightmare. He is in the hospital and Renaldi rushes over to him. Al is almost out of breath, but Renaldi sees it is a panic attack and nothing physically wrong. Major Weiss' secretary is taking some information from Al regarding Al himself for the major. The secretary is constantly spitting. Al is confused about why they need his personal medical history. Although the officer has not yet collected all the information, Weiss calls Al into his office with the secretary bringing in Al's file. Al's first question is about the secretary's spitting. Weiss replies that he has been that way since combat, which left a bad taste in his mouth. Al learns that Weiss wants his information as he wants to know who he's dealing with. Weiss reads about some insubordination on Al's part while in Vietnam, specifically a physical attack on a senior officer. Al gets the topic back to Birdy. They talk about the car, and the fact that Al's father reported it stolen when the boys drove it to Atlantic City. Weiss yells at Al for his wisecrack remarks. Weiss tells him that wise-crackers like him and Birdy usually end up institutionalized forever, but Al is certain that with time he can get through to his friend. Before Al leaves the room, he lies to the Major about his feelings toward his father in general and about the incident with the car. As Hannah caresses Birdy's face, Al tries to feed him. Birdy starts to eat. Hannah has to leave and asks Al to finish feeding Birdy. After Hannah leaves, Al tells Birdy that he thinks she likes him. Al then tells him to stop the act as it's making him crazy and might risk his life being institutionalized forever. Birdy stops eating but starts staring at Al. He's not sure if it is recognition or not. [Flashback to high school years] Birdy is lying in bed, playing with a mechanical bird he made. Birda flies onto his arm. After playing with her, he places her in the aviary he's built under his bed. Birdy's father comes into his room and tells him to go to sleep at it's 3 o'clock in the morning. Birdy's mom yells the same off from the distance. Birdy's father turns off the light and closes the door. Birda chirps. In class, Birdy is giving a verbal presentation on birds using his mechanical bird as a demonstration. The class is most enthralled with aspects of flying as they watch the mechanical bird fly around the room. Laughter erupts when the bird hits the window and crashes. As Birdy picks up the bird, one girl, Doris Robinson (Maude Winchester) gives Birdy a loving look which he notices. Later, Al mentions Doris' look to Birdy. Birdy doesn't seem interested in pursuing anything with Doris. Birdy heads to the school's basement to talk to his father who works there as a janitor. Birdy wants him to talk to his mother about letting him have a male canary to mate with Birda. Birdy's dad isn't so sure it's a good idea. He feels Birdy's mom thinks that canaries and Al as a friend won't get him far in life. He likens it to his own growing up situation, Birdy's dad's passion which was building things out of wicker. Birdy's dad and mom want to get him interested in something practical. But Birdy really wants this second canary, so Birdy's dad gives in to the idea of at least broaching the issue with his mom. Back in Birdy's bedroom, there are two canaries flying around, Birda in the general aviary, the male in a cage in the aviary. This will allow the two to get familiar with each other without having physical interaction until they are comfortable with each other. Al enters the room and notices the second bird. Birdy has named it Alfonso as it likes to fight and show off. Both Al and Birdy are enthralled watching the two. When Birdy starts making canary noises, Al looks at him like he's crazy. Al and Birdy are in Birdy's back yard lifting weights. Birdy is face down flapping his arms and legs mimicking flying. Birdy's mom tells them they're crazy. Al's retort is that she's crazy for hiding their baseballs. They surmise she's buried them somewhere. An alarm goes off. They've been weightlifting for an hour. Birdy admits he's doing this weightlifting so that he can fly. Al and Birdy are at the garbage dump. Birdy is saving a gull from a rat snake. As Birdy picks up the bird to let it fly away, he gets a stick to stab the snake to death. Al wants them to get on with their task as it smells there, but Birdy is in no hurry as he paces off a distance. Al is on Birdy's bike, while Birdy, who has just put on his home made wings, sits on the bike's handlebars. Birdy is certain this venture will work. Al starts pedaling as fast as he can. Birdy starts flapping his wings. Just before the drop-off, Al stops which propels Birdy into the air. Birdy takes flight for a fraction of a second before he starts to plummet to the ground. He lands in a cesspool below. Al rushes down to him as the weight of the wings is submerging Birdy under the shallow water. Birdy, not knowing what went wrong, is otherwise OK. [Forward to present day] Al is back in Birdy's hospital room. Al makes a joke about their relationship. Birdy smiles, which Al notices. Later Al tells Weiss about the smile. Weiss believes the smile is dissociative to the joke. Weiss, frustrated with Al, says that Birdy is more responsive to drug treatment than to him. Al yells back that the drugs are making Birdy not who he is. Weiss, Al's superior officer, won't tolerate Al's insubordination like he is aware Al is apt to be as he read through in his file. Al apologizes if only to be able to help Birdy. Weiss suggests that Al is no longer needed and that he should return to Fort Dix. As Weiss walks off, Al suggests one other thing from the past that may twig some memory in Birdy: the missing baseballs. He wants the army to ask Birdy's mom to send the baseballs. Weiss agrees to extend Al's visit until he can check about the baseballs. Al enters a gymnasium in the hospital where a wheelchair bound patient is dribbling and shooting hoops. Al claps in appreciation. The patient asks Al to join in. Al declines to go lift weights instead. He watches another legless man climbing rope. Al reminisces about how the war has been so different than they imagined it would be, and how immature they have been. As he continues his reminiscences, he goes to see that Hannah is giving Birdy a bath. [Flashback to high school years] Al and Birdy are in a truck with Joe Sagessa (Robert L. Ryan) who catches stray dogs and sells them. The guys want in on the business to make money. They spot a dog. They stop and get their equipment to catch the dog, Joe with a large hoop net, the boys with a large loose net. As they approach the dog, they see a herd of other dogs off in the distance. They all smell a war. As Joe tries to catch the original dog, it runs off, the other dogs fast on their tail. The guys get back into the truck to chase after the entire herd. They believe they have the dogs cornered against a chain link fence. They manage to catch most of the dogs and put them in the cage in the back of the truck. They drive off with the dogs, Joe telling them that he will deal with the dogs' disposal. Then a car approaches them from the side. The angry driver yells that his dog is in the back of Joe's truck. The angry driver tries to side swipe the truck. As the chase continues, Joe won't stop as he says they're almost at their destination: an abattoir, where the animals are electrocuted. The angry driver gets there just after the guys, the angry driver clamoring to get his dog back. Birdy attacks Joe and yells to Al to let the dogs go. Al unlocks the cage as the dogs run out. The angry driver is able to get his dog and he drives off. Al and Birdy run off away from an angry Joe. [Forward to present day] Hannah is still giving Birdy his bath. Al watches through the door window. Birdy is remembering back to a time in his past when a cat was approaching. He starts to thrash around in the bathtub scared. Hannah does not know why Birdy is in this scared state. [Flashback to high school years] Birdy is in his kitchen, washing a picture frame in the sink. He sees that specific cat outside, not really paying it much attention. Unknown to him, the cat makes it into the house and up into his bedroom. Finished his task in the kitchen, Birdy heads up to his room, but not before his mother complains about the birds attracting lice. In his room, he sees the cat with Birda in its mouth. Birdy lunges at the cat and tries to pry its mouth open. An angry Birdy manages to do so and grab the injured Birda as the cat runs off. Birdy has Birda cupped in his hands, caressing it. She isn't moving. All of a sudden, she begins to move, gets up and flies off. An excited Birdy watches her fly around the room. [Forward to present day] Birdy is staring out the window. Al, in the room, tells his friend that he won't give up on him. He admits he almost told Weiss about Birdy's flying. Al grabs Birdy off the floor, violently pushes him up against the wall, and yells at him to snap out of his condition. Al throws him back down on the floor and tells him to at least be consistent: he may try to act like a bird, but everything he is now doing is not bird-like. Hannah enters with a tray of food. Al continues to taunt Birdy, who is obviously reacting. Hannah yells at Al to stop, cradling a scared Birdy in her arms, but Al knows that he's tapped into something in Birdy's psyche. Al yells at Hannah about her inopportune entrance as he storms out of the room. Hannah follows Al into another private room and she sympathetically apologizes to him about the argument that just occurred. Al begins to feel her breasts and they start to kiss. Al quickly stops what he's doing, thinking more about how they can help Birdy than about the tenderness of the current situation. Al walks off leaving an emotional Hannah behind. Al goes into the bathroom, turns on the light and stares in the mirror. He begins to examine underneath the bandages on his face. It's dusk and Birdy, in his room, is naked, perched on the bed's foot-board like a bird. [Flashback to high school years] Birdy is staring at one of the canaries in its cage. It's nighttime, and a large shadow of a flapping bird is on the side of the building. Birdy, in over voice, is telling of his dream, where he and Birda become one. Birdy suddenly awakens from his dream. He looks down and realizes he's had a wet dream. He grabs a towel and wipes himself off. Birdy is examining the eggs Birda has laid as one begins to hatch. He realizes that what is happening is nature at work, but he is still amazed at the magic occurring before him, when all he did was put two birds together and feed them. He now has four canaries. All he now cares about is what is happening in his room in the aviary. Scenes cut between present day, with Birdy still perched like a bird on the foot-board of his hospital room bed, and his high school days, specifically focusing on the baby canaries. Birdy, in voice over, tells how the babies seem to know their place in the world. [Flashback to high school years] The phone is ringing. Birdy's mom enters his room, where Birdy, in only his briefs, is sitting on a chair, staring off into space. It's Doris on the phone, wanting to go to the prom with Birdy. Birdy's mom swears she'll kill him if he doesn't go with Doris rather than waste his time alone in his room as usual. She tells him to get rid of the birds as she leaves the room. At the prom, Birdy and Doris are slow dancing. Birdy seems to be in another world which a confused Doris notices. Al, dancing next to them, mimics for Birdy to take some romantic actions with Doris. Cutting to a fast song, they are still dancing. Birdy sees his father off in the distance. Birdy leaves to look for his father and leaves a confused and slightly embarrassed Doris to dance by herself. Birdy finds his father in one of the school's hallways, he who is mopping the floor. Birdy's father gives him a little money to take "his pretty girl" out somewhere after the dance. As Birdy's father heads off, Birdy tells him matter-of-factly that she's not his girl. Doris drives Birdy into a packed but quiet parking lot. She turns off the motor and sidles closer to Birdy. She thanks him for the wrist corsage, which she will keep as a memento. As she extends her hand out, Birdy removes the corsage. She also thanks him for taking her to the prom, which she knows he didn't want to do, but as a thank you, he can now have what he wants. She begins to remove the bodice of her dress, exposing her bare breasts. Birdy feels one of the breasts, more like it's a ball than part of a woman he wants to make love to. He stops. She again feels embarrassed, and pulls her dress back on, apologizing. They look into another car and see a couple making out. They wonder how they do it. As they are about to drive off, Doris makes it clear she wants to go out on another date. Birdy says he'll see her in school, not quite realizing that is not what she was asking. Birdy enters his bedroom. After he closes the door behind him, he begins to slowly disrobe. Totally naked, Birdy enters the aviary and crouches on the floor as he watches the canaries. He eventually lies down and one of the birds lands on his shoulder. He slowly grabs Birda in his hands, and brings it to his mouth as he begins to gently kiss her. In a semi-conscious state, he starts dreaming that there are several birds around him. He wants to tell Al of his dreams but is afraid to. There is nothing left in the real world to keep him alive. He wants to die and be born again as a bird. Still in an unconscious but excited state, he imagines himself flying around his room, then throughout the house, then around outside in the neighborhood, finally hovering over the make-shift baseball diamond. [Forward to present day] Al brings Birdy a tray of food. As Al tries to feed him, Birdy does not respond. Al apologizes for his behavior from before. Al leaves the tray of food next to Birdy, but before he leaves, he tells Birdy that he has to come back to reality. [Flashback to Vietnam] As a helicopter flies overhead, Al and another soldier are in a swampy area below. The other soldier, screaming, is badly wounded. Al yells into the distance that the soldier has been hit as more soldiers run toward them. As they approach, a bomb explodes. Screaming, Al grabs his bloodied face in agony. [Forward to present day] Al, crying, goes back to Birdy's room and stares at him through the door window. Al sits on the floor outside the door in a bad state. [Flashback to Vietnam] The helicopter lands. Several wounded soldiers, including Al, are helped onto the helicopter. [Forward to present day] Al, asleep, is lying on the floor outside of Birdy's room. Renaldi comes by with a suitcase. Al asks what it is. Renaldi replies that he doesn't know but that it came from Birdy's mother. An excited Al brings the suitcase into Birdy's room. He thinks the baseballs will get a reaction from Birdy. As Al opens the suitcase, the baseballs roll all over the floor. Birdy, lying on the floor, has no reaction. A disappointed Al starts to kick the balls in frustration, knowing that his own mental state is tenuous and if Weiss really knew what was going on in his head, he too would be institutionalized. He tells Birdy that he is more scared now than he was in the war, where he was more scared than anyone he knew there. Al sits down among the balls in frustration. [Flashback to high school years] Al enters Birdy's bedroom looking for him. He sees Birdy naked on the floor of the aviary. Al believes that Birdy's undressed state has something to do with having a good time with Doris. As Birdy starts to get dressed, Al asks for details about Doris. Instead, Birdy tells Al about his experience with flying last night, not like a bird, but as a bird. Angry, Al tells Birdy to stop these stupid fantasies as he storms out of the room. [Forward to present day] Still amidst the baseballs, Al apologizes to Birdy for saying those things about Birdy's flying and storming out. Weiss enters. Al gets up, takes Weiss outside the room and tells him the baseballs are working but that he needs a little more time. Weiss disagrees as Birdy is deteriorating. Al's time is up. [Flashback to high school years] Birdy is in his bedroom looking out the window to Al who is wearing an army uniform and carrying a duffel bag as he walks away. One of the canaries crawls under the open crack of the window and flies outside. Birdy yells for it to come back as it flies around outside. Birdy is madly trying to pry the window fully open without success. As Birdy continues trying to get the window open, the canary comes back and smashes into the closed window as Birdy screams. Birdy grabs the bird from the windowsill and caresses it in his hands. Its neck appears to be broken. Birdy weeps. Al is running down to street and boards a bus as it takes off. Birdy is in a fetal position on the floor of his bedroom. He is still in tears. [Flashback to Vietnam] A helicopter is flying over the jungle. Aboard are several soldiers, including an injured one screaming in pain. Birdy is aboard. The helicopter crashes. In the aftermath, there seems to be few if any survivors except an injured Birdy, who is sitting, leaning against a fallen tree. He sees a tropical bird and points up at it. A flock of birds fly overhead. There is a sound of a jet. A bomb is dropped within close vicinity. Much of the jungle goes up in flames. Although not directly in the flames, Birdy screams in a panic. He continues screaming as more birds fly overhead. There are several dead soldiers in the immediate area. [Forward to present day] Birdy is on the floor of his room crying. Al walks over to him, holds his head and tells him it's OK. Hannah enters the room. She is there as Weiss asked for Al as he should now leave the institution for good. Al is on the floor, with Birdy in his arms. Al refuses to leave until Birdy is OK. After Hannah leaves to tell Weiss, Al confesses to Birdy that they are both in a bad mental state and that life has got the better of them. Al wanted to do whatever he wanted to do in life, but that the authorities in charge will now dictate what happens to them. Al remembers back to when he was injured and the different feelings he had in being able to smell his burning flesh and not being able to do anything about it. He is scared that he won't recognize himself once the bandages are removed, and in not recognizing himself if he has lost his sense of who he is. He believes he may now be what the army wants him to be. As Al now wants to hide underneath the bandages forever, he understands that what Birdy is now doing

In 1942 California, two young men await induction into the U.S. Marines and say goodbye to their girlfriends. Henry and Nicky are small town pals from blue collar families with only a short time before they ship off to World War II. Henry begins romancing new-to-town Caddie Winger, believing her to be wealthy. Mischievious and irresponsible, Nicky gets into trouble which forces the other two to become involved, testing their relationship, as well as the friendship between the boys. —David Fowler In the Christmas of 1942, in Point Muir, California, the seventeen years-old Henry "Hopper" Nash is the best friend of the reckless Nicky, who dates the local Sally Kaiser. Henry and Nicky have enlisted themselves in the U.S. Marines and they are waiting to be summoned to travel very soon. When Henry sees the gorgeous Caddie Winger, he has a crush on her and follows Caddie to find where she lives. He discovers that her address is a fancy manor on the top of the hill and Henry believes she is a wealthy teenager while she is actually the daughter of the maid. Sooner Caddie and Henry date each other and they fall in love with each other. Meanwhile Sally gets pregnant and Nicky needs a large amount for an abortion. They try to raise the money and when Nicky is desperate, he takes an attitude that will test his friendship with Henry. —Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

Julie Richman (Deborah Foreman) is a typical "Valley girl" teenager (living in the San Fernando Valley of Los Angeles, California) who seems to have it all: good looks, popularity, and a handsome Valley dude boyfriend, named Tommy (Michael Bowen), but she is having second thoughts about her relationship with the arrogant and selfish Tommy. At the end of a shopping trip to the local mall with her friends, Loryn (Elizabeth Daily), Stacey (Heidi Holicker), and Suzi Brent (Michelle Meyrink), Julie runs into Tommy and breaks up with him. Later that day at the beach, Julie trades shy glances with a young man in the distance. That night, at a party at Suzi's house, Julie locks eyes with Randy (Nicholas Cage), a Hollywood punk who has crashed the party with his friend, Fred Bailey (Cameron Dye). They hit it off well, especially after Julie learns that Randy was the young man at the beach earlier. Tommy is jealous, and tries to seduce Loryn into bed. He fails and gets his cronies to eject Randy and Fred from the party. Undaunted, Randy sneaks back into the house, and hides in an upstairs bathroom shower. Randy waits in the shower for Julie to enter the bathroom as various partygoers come and go, talking about and trying to have sex, and doing drugs. When Julie eventually does enter, Randy convinces her to leave the party with him. Julie brings a very reluctant Stacey along for the ride with Randy and Fred. While at Randy's favorite Hollywood nightclub, Julie and Randy rapidly grow closer as Stacey continually rebuffs Fred's advances. Over the next few days Julie's friends, dismayed by her relationship with Randy, pressure her to drop him and get back together with Tommy. Julie asks her father (Frederic Forrest) for advice, and he kindly tells her that she should follow her heart. Despite this, Julie reconciles with Tommy and later dumps Randy. A heartbroken Randy gets severely drunk, makes out with his ex-girlfriend Samantha (Tina Theberge), and nearly gets into a fight with a gang of low riders before Fred saves him. Fred chides Randy for moping over Julie, but tells him that he needs to fight if he truly wants her back. After Randy flits about the Valley for the next few days just so he can get a glimpse at Julie, Fred says that he has a plan that will both reunite Randy with Julie and get revenge against Tommy. A minor subplot involves Suzi and her stepmother, Beth (Lee Purcell), vying for the attention of a boy named Skip (David Ensor). At the party, Suzi tells Beth, who is chaperoning, about Skip, who she likes and hopes will show up. When Skip does arrive, Beth finds herself attracted to him. Beth's boyfriend Lyle (Wayne Crawford) is oblivious to Beth's desire for the teenage guy Skip. However, Skip is also attracted to Beth and goes out of his way to go to see her without Suzi finding out by delivering groceries to the house while Suzi is not home. One day, Skip enters Suzi's house, apparently looking for Beth. He goes upstairs and finds a woman in the shower in Beth's bedroom. Skip and this woman, whose face is not shown, are then shown making love. Another woman arrives home and goes upstairs. The bedroom door opens, Beth enters, and only then it is shown that Suzi was in the shower and in bed with Skip. Skip and Suzi go to the prom together. As the rest of the girls make prom decorations, Stacey and Loryn chat over their post-prom plans. Stacey reveals that Tommy made a reservation at the Valley Sheraton Hotel as an after-prom "surprise" for Julie. Tommy and Julie ride to the prom in a rented stretch limousine; Randy and Fred arrive shortly after and sneak backstage. Randy becomes increasingly annoyed with just watching the Valley High kids dance, but Fred assures him that all is going according to plan. Julie and Tommy are escorted backstage, waiting to be introduced as king and queen of the prom. Randy confronts Tommy, and the two begin to brawl. When the prom king and queen are announced, the curtain pulls back to reveal Randy beating up Tommy. Randy knocks Tommy out, then escorts a thrilled Julie from the stage through the crowd. Tommy recovers and storms through the crowd towards Randy and Julie, who start a food fight to slow Tommy down and facilitate their escape from the venue in Tommy's rented limousine. As the happy couple ride into the night towards the Valley Sheraton, Julie removes Tommy's I.D. bracelet, which had been a sign of the relationship between the two during the entire film, and throws it out the window. The scene, which echoes the final scene of the film 'The Graduate', pans to the overview of the Valley, while the limo turns past the Sherman Oaks Galleria glowing in the night. End credits.

Set in Tulsa, Oklahoma, the film begins in a diner called Benny's Billiards, where local tough guy Rusty James is told by Midget that rival group leader Biff Wilcox wants to meet him that night in an abandoned garage lot for a fight. Accepting the challenge, Rusty James then talks with his friends: the wily Smokey, loyal B.J., and tall, nerdy Steve; who all have a different take on the forthcoming fight. Steve mentions that Rusty James' older brother, "The Motorcycle Boy," would not be pleased with the fight as he had previously created a truce forbidding gang fights, or "rumbles." Rusty James dismisses him, saying that the Motorcycle Boy (whose real name is never revealed) has been gone for two months, leaving without explanation or promise of return. Rusty James visits his girlfriend, Patty, then meets his cadre and walks to the abandoned garage lot, where Biff and his buddies suddenly appear. The two battle, with the fight ending when Rusty James disarms Biff and beats him almost unconscious. The Motorcycle Boy arrives dramatically on his motorcycle and his appearance distracts Rusty James who is slashed by Biff in the side with a shard of glass. Incensed, the Motorcycle Boy sends his motorcycle flying into Biff. The Motorcycle Boy and Steve take Rusty James home (past Officer Patterson, a street cop who's long had it in for the Motorcycle Boy) and nurse him to health through the night. Steve and the injured Rusty James talk about how the Motorcycle Boy is 21 years old, colorblind, partially deaf, and noticeably aloof; the last trait causing many to believe he is insane. The Motorcycle Boy and Rusty James share the next evening with their alcoholic, welfare-dependent father, who says that the Motorcycle Boy takes after his mother whereas, it is implied, Rusty James takes after him. Things start to go wrong for Rusty James and he's eventually kicked out of school after his frequent fights. Despite Rusty James's desire to resume gang activity, the Motorcycle Boy implies that he has no interest in doing so. Shortly after, Rusty James goes to a party at a lakeside cabin hosted by Smokey, where he has sex with another girl, causing Patty to break up with him. At Benny's some time later, Rusty James sees that Patty and Smokey have begun dating, and Smokey confesses that he set up the entire party so that Rusty James would cheat on Patty, driving her to leave him for Smokey. The two brothers and Steve head across the river one night to a strip of bars, where Rusty James enjoys briefly forgetting his troubles. The Motorcycle Boy mentions that he located their long-lost mother during his recent trip while she was with a movie producer, which took him to California although he did not reach the ocean. Later, Steve and Rusty James wander drunkenly home, and are attacked by thugs, but both are saved by the Motorcycle Boy. As he nurses Rusty James again, the Motorcycle Boy tells him that the gang life and the rumbles he yearns for and idolizes are not what he believes them to be. Steve calls the Motorcycle Boy crazy, a claim which the Motorcycle Boy does not deny, further prompting Rusty James to believe his brother is insane, just like his runaway mother supposedly was. Rusty James meets up with the Motorcycle Boy the next day in a pet store, where the latter is strangely fascinated with the Siamese fighting fish, which he refers to as "rumble fish." Officer Patterson suspects they will try to rob the store. The brothers leave and meet their father, who explains to Rusty James that, contrary to popular belief, neither his mother nor brother are crazy, but rather they were both born with an acute perception. The brothers go for a motorcycle ride through the city and arrive at the Pet Store where the Motorcycle Boy breaks in and starts to set the animals loose. Rusty James makes a last-gasp effort to convince his brother to reunite with him, but the Motorcycle Boy refuses, explaining that the differences between them are too great for them to ever have the life Rusty James speaks of. The Motorcycle Boy takes the fish and rushes to free them in the river, but is fatally shot by Officer Patterson before he can. Rusty James, after hearing the gunshot, finishes his brother's last attempt while a large crowd of people converges on his body. Rusty James finally reaches the Pacific Ocean (something the Motorcycle Boy failed to do) and enjoys the shining sun and flocks of birds flying around the beach. He also tries to forget what happened to his brother.