Ted Cogan, Rob Lowe, is a United States National Guard captain stationed at a checkpoint in Iraq. When a van pulls into the post and refuses to stop, he orders it to halt and fires a warning shot, but the van is shot up and bursts into flames. An Iraqi girl, Cristine Prosperi, emerges from the burning vehicle, and Ted soon learns that an innocent family has been killed. He makes a valiant attempt to help the girl, but the vehicle explodes and his unit is attacked, leaving him unconscious in a coma.
Two weeks later, Ted wakes up back in Chicago, home with his wife Molly Cogan, [Marnie McPhail], and his teenage son Max Cogan, [Ben Lewis]. He is overwhelmed by post-traumatic stress and guilt over the Iraqi deaths, and he begins to experience disturbing visions of a burned man who seems to be urging him to make amends. The turmoil unsettles not just him, but the fragile balance of his family life, as memories from the battlefield intrude on ordinary moments and strain relationships that used to feel steady.
With medical care out of reach due to financial hurdles and government denial, Ted searches for help and crosses paths with Jake Witzky, a fellow unsettled seeker who shares an appetite for unconventional answers. Jake encourages Ted to listen to the burned man in his dreams and to pursue the truth of what the spirit is asking him to do. This alliance propels Ted into a quest that blends grief, guilt, and the pursuit of accountability, even as it pulls him deeper into a maze of memories he would rather forget.
The emotional dominoes begin to fall when Max’s girlfriend Sammi, [Tatiana Maslany], and their friend Luke die in a car crash that also injures Max, sending a jolt of shock through Ted and Molly’s already fragile world. From the wreckage, messages begin to come through the veil of dreams, and the spirit Ted sees is Farzan, [Vik Sahay], an Arab-American college student who was beaten and then set on fire. Farzan’s presence becomes a living question: who killed him, and can Ted, through his own sense of justice, uncover the truth that remains buried?
As the threads tighten, Sammi and Luke—already bruised by the deaths of their own fathers in Iraq—grapple with anger and xenophobia. A tense roadside encounter with Farzan tests their loyalties and conscience. Farzan, trying to appear as a local American, asks for a simple favor to fix a flat tire, only to have the moment devolve into an emotionally charged confrontation. Sammi insults his bumper sticker that criticizes the oil industry and, in a drunken haze, begins to lash out. She exits the car and strikes Farzan with a whiskey bottle; Luke and Max rally to defend their friend, and the three of them rush to threaten or harm Farzan. Sammi’s suggestion to cut his head off—and the cruel escalation that follows, with Sammi pouring liquor over Farzan and a fatal decision to light him on fire—culminates in Farzan’s murder, and the friends tear away from the scene, haunted by what they have done and what it means for the moral landscape of their lives.
Back in the home orbit, Ted and Molly wrestle with the consequences of the killings and the weight of their choices. Ted wants to go to the police, but Molly reminds him of the soldiers’ crimes he carried with him from Iraq and questions whether any police pursuit could ever truly reconcile those acts. Ted asks Farzan’s spirit to reveal his wishes, and the strain of the moment drives him to breakdown. In a crisis that tests every thread of their marriage, Molly races to fetch a doctor, only to return and confront a terrifying scene: Ted is possessed by the burning spirit, gripping a loaded gun aimed at Max. A nurse calls for help as Molly fights to pull the gun away, and Ted, contending with the possession, pleads with Molly to kill him and turns the weapon on himself. In the struggle, Molly is accidentally shot and dies in his arms, a devastating tragedy that seals the night’s terrible turn.
At Molly’s burial, Ted explains to Max why he felt compelled to come forward and why he sacrificed the chance to protect his own family by letting justice unfold, even at the cost of his relationship with his son. Police move Max away to return him to jail, while Farzan’s spirit—the burn now extinguished—appears one final time to Ted, silently acknowledging the resolution he seeks as he walks away and seems to move on. Ted is left alone in a hospital setting, folded into a mental health unit where the line between memory and reality remains unstable, and where the idea of closure feels both just out of reach and within reach at the same time.
In the quiet hours of the hospital, Molly’s lingering presence visits Ted, a final reminder of the price paid and the cost of seeking justice. She asks if Farzan’s spirit is now satisfied, and Ted believes that peace has finally taken root. With that sense of completion, Molly’s spirit departs for good, offering a final, bittersweet goodbye to a life defined by duty, guilt, love, and the hard-won choice to do what is right, even when it is not easy.
