故事发生在繁华的大都市纽约，这里的生活对于年幼的女孩梅奇（阿娜塔·阿普洛 Onata Aprile 饰）来说却并不轻松。梅奇的母亲苏珊娜（朱丽安·摩尔 Julianne Moore 饰）是一个过气的摇滚明星，年老色衰的她日日郁郁寡欢，陷入愤怒的情绪中无法自拔，苏珊娜的丈夫比尔（史蒂夫·库根 Steve Coogan 饰）则是一个神经质的艺术品商人，两人的婚姻早已名存实亡，而梅奇的存在让他们都不甘心放手。
　　眼看着离婚无法避免，争夺梅奇的抚养权成为了苏珊娜和比尔两人的头等大事，为此，他们甚至找到了林肯（亚历山大·斯卡斯加德 Alexander Skarsgård 饰）和玛歌（乔安娜·万德汉姆 Joanna Vanderham 饰）作为新的伴侣，以此增加各自手中的筹码。家庭中，每个人都在战斗，却没有人关心梅奇真正的想法，除了林肯和玛歌。

 The film opens in a bleak police station where celebrated war correspondent Kate Rafter (Seagrove) faces questions from a psychiatrist, Dr Shaw (Kurylenko), as they work through the painful events of Rafter’s life. A horrific incident in war-torn Iraq and the death of her mother (Steed) have brought a haunted Rafter home to Herne Bay, a place she believed she had escaped forever. Her resentful sister (Friel) has not made her sister welcome and her forbearing husband Paul (Miles) fails to broker peace. Whilst packing up her mother’s belongings from her childhood home, Rafter comes to believe there is something strange and terrifying happening in the house next door.

 1916年，第一次世界大战在西线激烈进行，约克郡拉姆斯登的合唱协会失去了大部分男性成员，他们都应征入伍了。雄心勃勃的委员会决心继续前行，决定招募本地的年轻男性来填补队伍空缺。同时，他们还必须聘请一位新的合唱指挥，最有希望的人选是亨利·格思里博士（拉尔夫·费因斯 饰）——一个意志坚定、毫不妥协、刚从德国音乐生涯归来的男人。随着征兵通知陆续送达，全社区的人逐渐意识到，在战争摧毁一切的混乱中，最有力的回应就是：一起奏响音乐。

　　生活让野心勃勃的马戏团学徒蒂龙.鲍尔变成一个欺诈的艺术家和逐渐地进入一个假宗教性的印度教，他的生活从此就开始围着其导师旋转。与此同时，人翁斯丹并没有为五光十色的嘉年华会所迷恋而停留，因为他的心早就飞去了高档夜晚俱乐部......

　　Civil War veteran Josiah Grey comes to a small town to be a gospel minister. In time he has a family and many friends, but he also finds friction with a few of his parishioners. A young doctor grates at what he feels is the parson's interference in the scientific treatment of patients, and a mine owner resents Grey's protection of an old sharecropper whose small plot of land stands in the way of his continued mining. Grey must face a public health crisis and a lynch mob as a result, all seen and described through the eyes and memory of Grey's young nephew John.

　　the story “centers on a hard-drinking, promiscuous salesman who becomes a quadriplegic after a tragic accident and struggles to come to terms with his predicament and with his future.”

　　Diplomat is blackmailed for crimes committed while he had amnesia.

　　在康复中心戒毒治疗的金茉（安妮•海瑟薇 Anne Hathaway饰），因为姐姐蕾切尔（罗丝玛丽•德薇特 Rosemarie DeWitt 饰）即将举行婚礼，被父亲保罗（比尔•欧文 Bill Irwin 饰）接回了家。但她还是要定期去参加瘾君子互助会活动。巧的是，她发现姐夫的伴郎基兰（玛德•奇科尔 Mather Zickel 饰）竟然也是互助会成员，同命相怜的两人倍感亲近。
　　在交流中，金茉得知伴娘不是自己，勃然大怒。经过一番争取，蕾切尔最终还是同意金茉出任伴娘。但是，这次妥协并没未让姐妹重修旧好。金茉不合时宜的“道歉计划”让整个家庭陷入了矛盾之中，只有父亲始终细心维护着她。在一次争吵中，姐姐蕾切尔提及早年弟弟车祸死亡之事，这让金茉内心的负罪感愈加沉重，并导致她与母亲艾比（德博拉•温格 Debra Winger 饰）大打出手……

　　A Midwestern husband and father announces her plan to have a sex change operation.

　　穷困潦倒的乔（Jack Bittner 饰）在狭小的居室内得到神秘启示，为了生计，他开始经营出售梦境的生意。人们拥至他的门前，一位银行职员梦到被夜莺纠缠的女人；一位执着于签单的姑娘看到了一场流水线上模型人的爱情；职员妻子幻觉同一位绅士对话，主持放映了一场无声电影；强行闯入的罪犯眼前不断浮现旋转的圆，那似乎象征着欲望；女孩和盲老人给乔送来了古怪的铁丝玩具。乔送走所有客人，自己随即也陷入了一场梦境，他从一场诡异的牌局脱身出去，发现自己面临更玄妙的遭遇。
　　本片由汉斯·里希特在杜尚、卡尔德、麦克斯·爱恩斯特等几位艺术家的合作下完成，获得1947年威尼斯电影节特别奖。

　　Aston (Robert Shaw), a quiet, reserved man, lives alone in a top-floor cluttered room of a small abandoned house in a poor London district. He befriends and takes in Mac Davies (Donald Pleasence), an old derelict who has been fired from a menial job in a café. In time Aston offers him a job as caretaker of the house. Aston's brother, Mick (Alan Bates) - a taunting, quasi-sadist - harasses the derelict when his brother is away, countermanding his orders. Eventually Aston, himself irritated by the cantankerous old man, puts him out.