Aging King George III of England is exhibiting signs of madness, a problem little understood in 1788. As the monarch alternates between bouts of confusion and near-violent outbursts of temper, his hapless doctors attempt the ineffectual cures of the day. Meanwhile, Queen Charlotte and Prime Minister William Pitt the Younger attempt to prevent the king's political enemies, led by the Prince of Wales, from usurping the throne.
In 1930s fascist Italy, adolescent Luca just lost his mother. His father, a callous businessman, sends him to be taken care of by British expatriate Mary Wallace. Mary and her cultured friends - including artist Arabella, young widow Elsa, and archaeologist Georgie - keep a watchful eye over the boy. But the women's cultivated lives take a dramatic turn when Allied forces declare war on Mussolini.
Giff Hoyt, a cafe owner in Cabo Blanco, Peru after World War II is caught between refuge-seeking Nazis and their enemies. After the murder of a sea explorer is passed off as accidental death by the corrupt local police, Giff becomes suspicious. The police chief also intimidates a new arrival Marie, and Giff intervenes to help her. Giff suspects Beckdorff, a Nazi refugee living in the area. Beckdorff, it emerges, is seeking to uncover sunken treasure.
In 1950s Mexico City, William Lee, an American ex-pat in his late forties, leads a solitary life amidst a small American community. However, the arrival in town of Eugene Allerton, a young student, stirs William into finally establishing a meaningful connection with someone.
Inside the Blue Note nightclub one night in 1959 Paris, an aged, ailing jazzman coaxes an eloquent wail from his tenor sax. Outside, a young Parisian too broke to buy a glass of wine strains to hear those notes. Soon they will form a friendship that sparks a final burst of genius.
William Keane is barely able to cope. It has been six months since his six-year-old daughter was abducted from New York City’s Port Authority Bus Terminal while traveling with him. Repeatedly drawn to the site of the abduction, Keane wanders the bus station, compulsively replaying the events of that fateful day, as if hoping to change the outcome.
A tough, Jewish ex-con just released from prison crosses a powerful drug dealer and former prison rival in his return to a life of crime.
During the 1980s, uptight Ted Boynton is a salesman working in the Barcelona office of a Chicago-based company. He receives an unexpected visit from his cousin Fred, a naval officer who has come to Spain on a public relations mission for a U.S. fleet. Not exactly friends in the past, Ted and Fred strike up relationships with women in the Spanish city and experience conflicts -- Ted with his employer, and Fred with the Barcelona community.
Rock-and-roll singer Mary Rose Foster's romantic relationships and mental health are continuously imperilled by the demands of life on the road.
A Martinique charter boat skipper gets mixed up with the underground French resistance operatives during WWII.
A group of disillusioned American expatriate writers live a dissolute, hedonistic lifestyle in 1920's France and Spain.
A ticking-time-bomb insomniac and a slippery soap salesman channel primal male aggression into a shocking new form of therapy. Their concept catches on, with underground "fight clubs" forming in every town, until an eccentric gets in the way and ignites an out-of-control spiral toward oblivion.
An American woman is stranded in Tokyo after breaking up with her boyfriend. Searching for direction in life, she trains to be a ramen chef under a tyrannical Japanese master.
The story of acerbic 1960s comic Lenny Bruce, whose groundbreaking, no-holds-barred style and social commentary was often deemed by the establishment as too obscene for the public.
Nick Hart is a struggling American artist who lives amongst the expatriate community in 1920s Paris. He spends most of his time drinking and socializing in local café's and pestering gallery owner Libby Valentin to sell his paintings. He becomes involved in a plot by wealthy art patroness Nathalie de Ville to forge three paintings. This leads to several run-ins with American rubber magnate Bertram Stone, who happens to be married to Hart's ex-wife Rachel.
Tomas and Martin are a gay couple living in Paris whose marriage is thrown into crisis when Tomas impulsively begins a passionate affair with young schoolteacher Agathe. But when Martin begins an affair of his own, Tomas must confront life decisions he may be unprepared—or unwilling—to deal with.
During the 1960s, two American jazz musicians living in Paris meet and fall in love with two American tourist girls and must decide between music and love.
Unable to cope with his military father's sudden death in combat, quick-tempered teen, Conor, starts getting into serious trouble. During an intense lacrosse camp, his father's old friend challenges Conor to get his life on track and become a man.
Ralph visits France with his father, a shipbuilder, and falls in love with Blossom, the granddaughter of his father's friend, a Civil war veteran not reconciled with the Union. Blossom, however, is engaged to a French nobleman. When the war breaks out, Ralph enlists, while his brother Jim, a heartbreaker, is drafted.
The daughter of iconic actor John Barrymore is reunited with her father after a ten year estrangement and engages in his self-destructive lifestyle.