A fictionalised version of the events surrounding the Ku Klux Klan's murder of three civil rights workers in Mississippi in 1964. Anderson and Ward (Gene Hackman and Willem Dafoe) are the FBI men sent to investigate the case. What they find is a tangled web of intimidation and silence, with no one willing to speak about the events for fear of Klan reprisals. The supporting cast features Brad Dourif as a local lawman and Frances McDormand in an Oscar-nominated performance as his wife.

Eleven-year-old Timmy (Macaulay Culkin) is about to be reunited with his ex-con father (Ted Danson), who he has not seen for years. Unfortunately he arrives to witness dad, now a pastry chef, preparing for one last heist to set him up for life. However, once the theft has taken place, Timmy hides the booty, and blackmails his father into spoiling him rotten in return for telling him the loot's whereabouts.