Adapted from the 1951 non-fiction account by psychoanalyst Georges Devereux, “Psychotherapy Of A Plains Indian,” the film follows the true story of Picard (Del Toro), a Plains Indian of the Blackfeet nation, as he returns from WWII and begins experiencing unexplainable symptoms shortly thereafter. He travels to the famous Winter Hospital in Topeka, Kansas, where he meets Devereux (Amalric), thus beginning a professional and personal friendship guided by compassion and understanding of Native American culture.

Nick Twisp (Michael Cera), a teen with a taste for the finer things in life like Sinatra and Fellini, falls hopelessly in love with the beautiful, free-spirited Sheeni Saunders (Portia Doubleday) while on a family vacation. But family, geography and jealous ex-lovers conspire to keep these two apart. Nick abandons his dull, predictable life and develops a rebellious alter ego: François. With his ascot, his moustache and his cigarette, François will stop at nothing to be with Sheeni, and leads Nick on a path of destruction with unpredictable consequences..