Actor Matt Damon (1970)

While the plot of The Last Duel is portrayed in three separate chapters, each telling the same story from the perspective of the three main characters, the following description summarizes all three presentations into a single thread. After serving in the Caroline War, French squires Jean de Carrouges and Jacques Le Gris swear allegiance to Count Pierre d’Alençon, who has been named Jean’s overlord by King Charles VI. Jacques later tells Jean that Pierre has tasked him with collecting war levies, agreeing to ask for leniency on Jean’s behalf when his brother-in-arms explains he lacks the funds. To restore his finances, Jean marries Marguerite de Thibouville on the ...

Stillwater, Oklahoma oil worker Bill Baker travels to Marseille, Southern France to visit his daughter Allison, who is five years into serving a nine-year prison sentence. While attending university in Marseille, Allison was convicted of killing her roommate and unfaithful lover, Lina. During Bill’s first meeting with Allison, she asks him to pass a letter to her defense lawyer, Mrs. Leparq. Bill finds Leparq, who tells him that the letter says that Allison heard from her former professor about a man who claimed to be Lina’s killer. Leparq refuses to attempt to reopen the case because the new information is just hearsay. Bill lies to Allison, telling her that Leparq will ...

In 1963, Ford Motor Company Vice President Lee Iacocca proposes to Henry Ford II to purchase the Italian cash-strapped Ferrari as a means to boost their car sales by participating in the 24 Hours of Le Mans. Enzo Ferrari however, uses Ford’s offer to secure a more lucrative deal with Fiat that allows him to retain complete ownership of Scuderia Ferrari. In rejecting the proposed deal with Ford, Ferrari also intentionally insults both Ford Motor and Henry Ford II. In response, a furious Ford orders his racing division to build a car to defeat Ferrari at Le Mans. For this task, Iacocca hires Shelby American owner Carroll Shelby, a former driver who won Le Mans in 1959 but was ...

Searching for a way to address overpopulation and global warming, Norwegian scientist Dr. Jørgen Asbjørnsen develops “downsizing”, an irreversible process that shrinks organic material. He becomes part of the first group of human test subjects and is encouraged that the process reduces people to a height of approximately five inches[a], drastically decreasing their consumption and waste. When the findings are revealed at a conference five years later, there is a global sensation. Ten years later, Paul and Audrey Safranek, a financially-struggling married couple in Omaha, see Dave and Carol Johnson, who have downsized, at Paul’s ...

In 1959, the peaceful, all-white neighborhood of Suburbicon is shaken by the arrival of the African-American Mayers family. Gardner Lodge, a seemingly mild-mannered family man, lives in Suburbicon with his paraplegic wife, Rose, and their son, Nicky. One night when Rose’s identical twin sister, Margaret, is staying over, two robbers, Sloan and Louis, break into his house, tie the whole family up, and knock them out with chloroform. Rose receives an overdose and never regains consciousness. After the funeral, Margaret moves in to help take care of Nicky and soon begins to transform herself into Rose, dyeing her hair blonde and having sex with Gardner.

12 years after he exposed Operation Blackbriar and disappeared, Jason Bourne has finally recovered from his amnesia, isolating himself from the world and making a living by taking part in savage, bareknuckle fighting bouts in Greece. In Reykjavík, Nicky Parsons, who has been collaborating with a hacktivist group led by Christian Dassault, hacks into the CIA’s mainframe computer server to expose its black ops programs. This alerts Heather Lee, the head of the agency’s cybersecurity operations division, and CIA director Robert Dewey. In the process, Parsons finds documentation concerning Bourne’s recruitment into Treadstone and his father’s role in the program. ...

European mercenaries, including Irishman William Garin and Spaniard Pero Tovar, travel to China during the reign of the Song dynasty’s Renzong Emperor, searching for the secret to gunpowder. A few miles north of the Great Wall, they are attacked by a monster. Only Garin and Tovar survive; they sever the monster’s arm and bring it with them. Upon reaching the Wall, they are taken prisoner by soldiers of the Nameless Order, led by General Shao and Strategist Wang. The Nameless Order exists to combat alien monsters called Tao Tie, which arrived from a meteorite and attack once every sixty years. While examining the severed monster arm, the Order’s commanders are ...

In 2035, the crew of the Ares III mission to Mars is exploring Acidalia Planitia on Martian solar day (sol) 18 of their 31-sol expedition. A severe dust storm threatens to topple their Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV). The mission is scrubbed, but as the crew evacuates, astronaut Mark Watney is struck by debris. The telemetry from his suit’s bio-monitor is damaged and Watney is erroneously presumed dead. With the MAV (Mars Ascent Vehicle) on the verge of toppling, the remaining crew takes off for their orbiting vessel, the Hermes. Watney awakens after the storm, injured and with a low-oxygen warning. He returns to the crew’s surface habitat (“Hab”) and treats his ...

In 1943, the Allies are making good progress driving back the Axis powers in Italy. Frank Stokes convinces President Roosevelt that victory will have little meaning if the artistic treasures of Western civilization are lost. Stokes is directed to assemble an Army unit nicknamed the “Monuments Men”, comprising museum directors, curators, art historians, and an architect, to both guide Allied units and search for stolen art to return it to its rightful owners. In July 1944, Claire Simone, a curator in occupied France, is forced to assist Nazi officer Viktor Stahl in overseeing the theft of art for either Adolf Hitler’s Führermuseum ...

In 2067, crop blights and dust storms threaten humanity’s survival. Cooper, a widowed engineer and former NASA pilot turned farmer, lives with his father-in-law, Donald, his 15-year-old son, Tom, and 10-year-old daughter, Murphy “Murph”. After a dust storm, patterns inexplicably appear in the dust covering Murphy’s bedroom, which she thinks is the work of a ghost. Cooper deduces the patterns were caused by gravity variations and they represent geographic coordinates in binary code. Cooper follows the coordinates to a secret NASA facility headed by Professor John Brand. There he learns that 48 years earlier, unknown beings ...

In the mid 22nd century, Earth has become overpopulated and heavily polluted, with most of the citizens living in poverty while the rich and powerful live on Elysium, a space station in Earth’s orbit equipped with Med-Bays, advanced medical devices that cure all injuries and diseases. A feud occurs between the rich and the poor. Max Da Costa, a laborer in Los Angeles, is accidentally exposed to a lethal dose of radiation at work. He is rescued and informed that he has only five days to live. Desperate, Max and his friend Julio seek help from a human smuggler named Spider to get him to Elysium in order to use a Med-Bay. Defense Secretary ...

At some point in the future, Qohen Leth, an eccentric and reclusive programmer who refers to himself in the plural, works crunching “entities” for the ontological research division of a large company called Mancom. He does not like having to leave the quiet, fire-damaged church in which he lives to travel the bright, crowded streets and work in a noisy office and fears missing a mysterious phone call he has been expecting for years, so he requests disability leave or permission to work from home. Though he points to the fact that all of his hair has fallen out as evidence he is dying, three company doctors determine he is physically healthy, but they do require he start ...

In 1977, 18-year-old Scott Thorson, who works as an animal trainer for films, meets Bob Black, a Hollywood producer, in a gay bar in Los Angeles. At Black’s urging, he leaves his adopted home in search of better-paying work. Black introduces Thorson to Liberace, who takes an immediate liking to the handsome younger man. Liberace invites the two backstage and then to his luxurious home in Las Vegas. Thorson observes that one of Liberace’s beloved dogs is suffering from a temporary form of blindness, and with his veterinary assistant background, informs the famous pianist that he knows how to cure the condition. After treating the dog, Thorson becomes Liberace’s ...

Steve Butler has caught the eyes of top management at his employer, Global Crosspower Solutions, an energy company that specializes in obtaining natural gas trapped underground through a process known as fracking. Butler has an excellent track record for quickly and cheaply persuading land owners to sign mineral rights leases that grant drilling rights over to his employer. Butler and his partner Sue Thomason arrive in an economically struggling Pennsylvania farming town whose citizens are proud of having family farms passed from one generation to the next. Coming from a town and a life very similar to that of the people he is now determined to win ...

Returning from a Hong Kong business trip, Beth Emhoff meets with her ex-boyfriend during a Chicago layover. Two days later, back home in suburban Minneapolis, Beth’s husband, Mitch, rushes her to the hospital when she suffers a seizure. She dies from a previously unknown virus. Returning home, Mitch finds that his stepson, Clark, has also died. Mitch is isolated but found to be naturally immune. After being released, Mitch protectively keeps his teenage daughter, Jory, quarantined at home. In Atlanta, Department of Homeland Security representatives meet with Dr. Ellis Cheever of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) over ...

Benjamin Mee has been grieving the loss of his wife, Katherine, for six months. When his 14-year-old son, Dylan, is expelled, he decides to make a fresh start by buying a house. Benjamin tours many homes with his 7-year-old daughter, Rosie, and his realtor, Mr. Stevens, but they find none to their liking. Rosie finds a listing for a large, old house, and upon seeing the house, they decide it is perfect for them. When they hear a lion roar, Stevens explains that if they want the house, then they must also buy the zoo on the property which closed several years before. Benjamin sees Rosie happily playing with the peacocks and decides to buy it. Dylan, ...

A 17-year-old Manhattan student, Lisa Cohen, shopping on the Upper West Side, interacts with bus driver Gerald Maretti as she runs alongside his moving bus; he allows himself to become distracted, leading to a fatal accident by missing a red light, in which a pedestrian, Monica Patterson, is hit by the bus and subsequently dies in Lisa’s arms. Initially, Lisa reports to the police that the driver had a green traffic signal, but later, out of remorse, changes her story. She confronts Maretti, who first pretends to have forgotten the details of the accident, and then reveals to her in anger that he does remember them, but believes he did nothing wrong, causing Lisa to pursue his ...

In 2006, Brooklyn Congressman David Norris unsuccessfully runs for the United States Senate. While rehearsing his concession speech, David meets Elise Sellas. They share a passionate kiss, though he does not get her name. Inspired by her, David delivers an unusually candid speech that is well-received, making him a favorite for the next campaign. A month later, David prepares for a new job. At Madison Square Park, near David’s home, Harry Mitchell receives an assignment from his superior Richardson. Harry is to spill coffee on David’s shirt by 7:05 AM so he misses his bus. However, he falls asleep; David boards the bus, meets Elise again and gets her phone number.

Erik, son of Mumble and Gloria, can’t dance like the other penguins and feels out of place. He and his best friends, Bodicea and Atticus, follow one of Mumble’s friends, Ramón, leader of the Amigos, to Adélie-Land which is now being ruled by a flying penguin con artist called the Mighty Sven. After surviving the loss of his native fishing grounds due to his “miraculous” ability to fly, he hired another of Mumble’s friends, Lovelace (who was fired from his job as “Guru”) to be his partner. They tell the others they were saved by humans but fled to Antarctica after believing they’d be eaten. There Sven performs his first miracles by ...

The father of fourteen-year old Mattie Ross is murdered by hired hand Tom Chaney while on a trip to Fort Smith, Arkansas to purchase horses. While collecting her father’s body, Mattie asks the local sheriff about the search for Chaney. He tells her that Chaney has likely fled with “Lucky” Ned Pepper and his gang into Indian Territory, where the sheriff has no authority, so she inquires about hiring a Deputy U.S. Marshal. The sheriff gives three recommendations, and Mattie chooses the “meanest” of the three, Rooster Cogburn. Cogburn initially rebuffs her offer, doubting both her grit and her wealth, but she raises the money by aggressive ...