An alien is left behind on Earth and saved by the 10-year-old Elliot who decides to keep him hidden in his home. While a task force hunts for the extra-terrestrial, Elliot, his brother, and his little sister Gertie form an emotional bond with their new friend, and try to help him find his way home.
When Oscar realises he might have missed his final chance to say goodbye to his best friend Ashley, he decides to hijack the dusty old country school bus and go after her.
A single mother suffers a devastating stroke leaving her teenage daughter and 7-year-old son to care for her, testing the family's strength to hold things together as their roles are reversed.
Seven British children bury their mother and hide her death, until their long-lost father returns.
A British spy is banished to Panama after having an affair with an ambassador's mistress. Once there he makes connection with a local tailor with a nefarious past and connections to all of the top political and gangster figures in Panama. The tailor also has a wife, who works for the Panamanian president and a huge debt. The mission is to learn what the President intends to do with the Canal.
Writer Harry Block draws inspiration from people he knows, and from events that happened to him, sometimes causing these people to become alienated from him as a result.
The lives of two lovelorn spouses from separate marriages, a registered sex offender, and a disgraced ex-police officer intersect as they struggle to resist their vulnerabilities and temptations.
Bilike has never seen a ping-pong ball before. He and his family live without electricity and running water in a solitary tent home among the vast steppe grasslands. The magnificent landscape here has changed little since the days of Genghis Kahn. But life in the middle of nowhere can be exciting for a young boy. The smallest of details become big events for curious Bilike and his best friends Erguotou and Dawa. The mystery of the small white ball floating in the creek leads to questions about the world around them, as well as innocent mischief.
A ruthless real estate agent discovers a passion for piano and auditions with help from a young virtuoso, but the pressures of his corrupt career threaten to derail his musical aspirations.
Charlie Kaufman is a confused L.A. screenwriter overwhelmed by feelings of inadequacy, sexual frustration, self-loathing, and by the screenwriting ambitions of his freeloading twin brother Donald. While struggling to adapt "The Orchid Thief," by Susan Orlean, Kaufman's life spins from pathetic to bizarre. The lives of Kaufman, Orlean's book, become strangely intertwined as each one's search for passion collides with the others'.
In Depression-era West Virginia, a serial-killing preacher hunts two young children who know the whereabouts of a stash of money.