Two estranged sisters go in search of their uncle, a mysterious figure who may hold the key to their father's suicide and their family's unhappiness.

A young widower sidesteps grief, loss, and familial dysfunction when he steals his wife's ashes and sets off on an impulsive odyssey through America's heartland to find something he'd lost long before her death.

A down and out, 50-year-old former high school teacher with a dark secret befriends three 12-year-old boys and helps one come to grips with his father's death. Problems arise when the police suspect the teacher of wrongdoing.

A 16-year-old girl visits her aunt in Chicago for the summer. While there, she falls for another girl, and she and her aunt challenge each other's sex and spirit.

A woman leaves an abusive husband to start a new life in Chicago, where she befriends a man undergoing an emotional crisis, who she does not know is a professional killer, and a detective, who is investigating the hit man.