Harry Odum, Norman Reedus, is an eighteen-year-old burger-boy who lives in a cramped old apartment with his mother, Kate Odum, Debbie Harry. She treats him like a lifelong child, even drawing his bathwater and switching off his reading lamp to grab his attention. The world outside feels distant and dangerous, yet a spark of turmoil lies just beneath the surface of his quiet life.
One night, his oldest and closest friend, Arnie Finklestein, Adrien Brody, heads to a strip club where his mob boss is owed money. Harry watches in stunned disbelief as Arnie beats the owner, and a surge of rage—unnerving and unfamiliar—surges through him. He joins in, the violence feeding a thrill he can’t fully name, and Arnie has to pull him away to keep from going too far. Outside, the two are shaken, but Harry feels something sharpen within him, a lure toward a world he’s never imagined he could belong to.
Later, Abie Pinkwise, Peter Appel, the man who runs the local operation, meets the pair at a diner. He sees something raw and explosive in Harry and invites him to become his apprentice in the mob business. Harry accepts, stepping onto a path that feels both exhilarating and terrifying. When Arnie attempts a small heist, it goes wrong, and a clerk holds him at gunpoint, landing him in jail. Harry faces a choice: walk away or prove his loyalty. He chooses loyalty, telling the mob nothing as they threaten him and the police close in, and the bosses spring him from jail, elevating him with a private celebration at a brothel.
At the brothel, a quiet, awkward moment nearly overwhelms him. A sex worker asks if he’s afraid or broken, and Harry confesses his confusion about his own desires, admitting he doesn’t feel right with either sex. Iris, Elina Löwensohn, the Hungarian maid in Louis Varga’s house, offers him a coffee—and in this tense, intimate moment, Madden, Holter Graham, the darker facet of Harry, appears. Madden pushes Harry toward fearsome acts, and Iris, unsettled by the force behind him, quits. Varga forces Harry to apologize and even pretend to be in love with Iris to keep her in his employ, and she agrees to stay, though the relationship grows into something real for Harry, who slowly begins to fall for Iris despite the danger around them.
Harry longs for a different life, one where he can move into a house of his own and escape his mother’s suffocating grip. But when he finally finds a place, Kate insists on moving with him and fills the house with memories of their old apartment, fueling Harry’s anger. Arnie is released from prison, and Harry hopes to recruit him again as a getaway driver for a new job. The plan goes awry when the target turns out to be Abie’s long-lost uncle, throwing the operation into chaos. Arnie escapes, Abie sinks deeper into despair, and Harry’s world spirals further out of control.
As the pressure mounts, Madden reappears, pulling Harry toward Iris and then toward a den of danger at a brothel. He flirts with a return to his old, impulsive self, but ultimately turns to his mother for comfort, a choice that deepens Kate’s hold over him and strains Harry’s romance with Iris. Flashbacks reveal Madden is not just a mask but a core part of Harry’s identity, and with this revelation, Harry and Iris begin to confront the fragility of their relationship.
With Arnie’s betrayal constant in the background, the mob pushes Harry toward violence. Arnie comes forward with a claim of immunity, flipping on Harry and Abie, and the truth comes out under interrogation. Yet the mob’s appetite for control remains unquenched, and Mr. Varga orders Harry and Abie to kill Arnie. In a brutal diner confrontation, Harry shoots Arnie, a decisive act that closes that chapter and reopens another: Madden’s impulses flare again, but Harry clings to reality enough to realize the damage he’s caused.
Morning breaks, and Kate’s suspicions harden into a deadly certainty. After a tense confrontation, Kate discovers Iris’s hair in Harry’s underwear, forcing a brutal reckoning: Harry admits he has a girlfriend, and Kate insists on meeting her. At a tense family dinner where Iris is meant to join them, Kate’s jealousy erupts, driving a wedge between Harry and Iris and tightening her grip on him. He tries to resist, but his mother’s influence proves overpowering, driving a wedge between his desires and his loyalties.
The mob’s pressure intensifies. Harry confronts the moral cost of his life in crime when Varga orders the killing of Abie. In a final, brutal moment, Harry uses the very ice-pick given to him earlier to kill Abie in a crowded diner, watched by witnesses who cannot look away. Madden resurfaces, and in a moment of primal relief, Harry seeks solace first with Iris and then with a brothel before returning to his mother’s orbit. Flashbacks reveal Madden’s dominance over his psyche, forcing Harry to face the truth about who he has become.
In the end, after a chilling awakening, Harry discovers Kate dead by her own hand—though the truth is murky, his mental state cannot fully process it. Mr. Varga calls to relocate the operation, and Harry answers with a grim resolve to escape the life he dragged Kate into. He grabs his mother’s corpse to keep it from hindering their escape and, in a final, fatal moment, shoots both Mr. Varga and his henchman, taking the car and heading for the bus station.
Iris has fled to California to be with her brother, and the two of them head toward a new future on a bus, finally free from the city’s shadows. They sit side by side, hopeful and relieved—until a stark panorama of the past catches up in a single, haunting image: Kate’s body bag rests unwittingly on the seat beside them, a chilling reminder of the price of escape and the cost of choosing a life forged in a world of crime.
