Dominick "Dom" Cobb (Leonardo DiCaprio) and Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) are "extractors", people who perform corporate espionage using an experimental military technology to infiltrate the subconscious of their targets and extract information while experiencing shared dreaming. Their latest target is Japanese businessman Saito (Ken Watanabe). The extraction from Saito fails when sabotaged by a memory of Cobb's deceased wife Mal (Marion Cotillard). Saito reveals that he was actually auditioning the team to perform the difficult act of "inception": planting an idea in a person's subconscious.
The film takes place in 1936, at the height of the Great Depression. Johnny Hooker, a grifter in Joliet, Illinois, cons $11,000 in cash from an unsuspecting victim with the aid of his partners Luther Coleman and Joe Erie. Buoyed by the windfall, Luther announces his retirement and advises Hooker to seek out an old friend, Henry Gondorff, in Chicago to teach him "the big con". Unfortunately, their victim was a numbers racket courier for vicious crime boss Doyle Lonnegan. Corrupt Joliet police Lieutenant William Snyder confronts Hooker, revealing Lonnegan's involvement and demanding part of Hooker’s cut. Having already spent his share, Hooker pays Snyder in counterfeit bills. Lonnegan's men murder Luther, and Hooker flees for his life to Chicago.
Career criminal Neil McCauley (Robert De Niro) and his crew, Chris Shiherlis (Val Kilmer), Michael Cheritto (Tom Sizemore) and Trejo (Danny Trejo), hire new recruit Waingro (Kevin Gage) and commit an armored car heist, stealing $1.6 million in bearer bonds belonging to money launderer Roger Van Zant (William Fichtner). However, Waingro impulsively kills one of the guards, forcing the robbers to kill the remaining two so as to leave no witnesses. An infuriated McCauley tries to kill Waingro afterwards, but he escapes. Afterwards McCauley's fence, Nate (Jon Voight), suggests they try to sell the bonds back to Van Zant, who agrees but secretly instructs his men to kill McCauley at the meeting. With backup from his crew, McCauley thwarts the ambush and vows revenge.
The film begins at 62 West Wallaby Street on Gromit's birthday at breakfast. After being tipped out of bed and dressed using several mechanical contraptions, Wallace is greeted with a large pile of bills. Wallace remembers Gromit's birthday and presents Gromit with a somewhat unwelcome gift of a spiked dog collar, and a second present of a pair of ex-NASA robotic "Techno Trousers", acquired by Wallace to alleviate the burden of taking Gromit for walks. While Gromit is out on a "walk", Wallace realizes they are in financial difficulty and decides to let the spare bedroom out. He is answered by an inscrutable-looking penguin named Feathers McGraw. The penguin comes to stay at the house, pushing Gromit out of his comfortable bedroom and keeping him awake at night with loud music. On the other hand, Wallace takes a liking to him. Feathers also takes an interest in the Techno Trousers after seeing Gromit use their suction feet to walk on the ceiling.
The movie follows the story of an amiable kindergarten director named Troshkin who looks exactly like a cruel criminal nicknamed Docent (Доцент, literally associate professor) that has stolen Alexander the Great's helmet at an archaeological excavation. Docent and his gang are caught by police, but Docent is imprisoned in a different jail than his mates. Since Troshkin looks identical to Docent, the police send him undercover to prison with the real criminals to get information about the stolen helmet. He must pretend to be the real felon Docent, so in order to be convincing, Troshkin, a well-educated and good-natured man, has to learn slang and manners of criminals.
A deadly firefight and a fire aboard a ship docked in the San Pedro Bay leaves only two survivors: a Hungarian criminal named Arkos Kovaz hospitalized from severe burns, and a small-time con artist, Roger "Verbal" Kint (Kevin Spacey), a pathetic cripple. Separately, FBI agent Jack Baer (Giancarlo Esposito) and Customs agent Dave Kujan (Chazz Palminteri) arrive in San Pedro, lured by reports of a large cocaine shipment, and Kujan's personal vendetta against Dean Keaton (Gabriel Byrne), a formerly corrupt police officer who has since given up his life of crime but who was supposedly involved in the massacre. While Baer is at the hospital attempting to get security for Kovaz, Kovaz begins yelling in Hungarian, and mentions the name Keyser Söze, which stops and stuns Baer. As Verbal later explains, Söze has a near mythical and vengeful reputation, having killed his own family when they were held hostage by a Hungarian gang and then killing all but one of the gang members before disappearing underground, keeping his true identity secret by insulating himself from his agents, who usually do not know for whom they are working.
In 1973, Sam "Ace" Rothstein (Robert De Niro) is a sports handicapper and Mafia associate who is sent to Las Vegas to run the Teamsters Union-funded Tangiers Casino on behalf of the Chicago Outfit. He hires old friend Billy Sherbert (Don Rickles) as his manager. In between, Ace and his friend, mob enforcer and caporegime Nicholas "Nicky" Santoro (Joe Pesci), narrate how the mob bosses control the Teamsters Union, which gives out money for casinos that they own, such as The Tangiers, and how they also drive off rival crews and get rid of cheaters. Ace becomes the Tangiers' de facto boss by taking advantage of lax gaming laws allowing him to work at the casino while his gaming license is still pending. He doubles the casino's profits, which are skimmed by the Mob before the records are reported to income tax agencies. The bosses are impressed with Ace's work and send Nicky to protect Ace and the whole business, along with Nicky's brother Dominick, Nicky's friend and subordinate Frank Marino (Frank Vincent), and the rest of Nicky's soldiers in his crew. Nicky, however, becomes more of a liability than an asset; his criminal activities- which he makes nearly no effort to conceal- and his violent and vicious temper quickly gets him banned by the gaming board from every casino, and his name is placed in the Black Book. In retaliation, Nicky gathers his own crew, opens a jewelry store and restaurant, begins running unsanctioned shakedowns and burglaries, and soon after is considered the mob boss of Vegas.
After stealing an 86-carat (17.2 g) diamond in a heist in Antwerp, Franky "Four-Fingers" goes to London to deliver it to diamond dealer Doug "The Head" on behalf of New York jeweller "Cousin Avi". One of the other robbers advises Franky to obtain a gun from ex-KGB agent Boris "The Blade". Unbeknownst to Franky, Boris and the robber are brothers and plan to steal the diamond from him before he can turn it over to Doug.
On Christmas Eve, New York City Police Detective Lieutenant John McClane arrives in Los Angeles to reconcile with his estranged wife, Holly. McClane is driven to the Nakatomi Plaza building for a company Christmas party by Argyle. While McClane changes clothes, the party is disrupted by the arrival of Hans Gruber and his heavily armed group: Karl, Franco, Tony, Theo, Alexander, Marco, Kristoff, Eddie, Uli, Heinrich, Fritz, and James. The group seize the tower and secure those inside as hostages, except for McClane, who manages to slip away.
Hossain Sabzian is a cinephile, and in particular a big fan of popular Iranian director Mohsen Makhmalbaf. One day, Sabzian is riding a bus with a copy of the novel The Cyclist; Mrs. Ahankhah sits next to him, revealing she is a fan of the novel's film adaptation. Sabzian tells her that he himself is Makhmalbaf, the maker. She is then surprised that a famous director would ride public transportation; Sabzian explains in response (posing as Makhmalbaf) that he finds his film subjects this way, telling her that art must spring from life. Posing as Makhmalbaf from this point on, Sabzian visits the Ahankhah family several times over the next two weeks. He flatters them by saying he wants to use not only their house in his next film, but also their sons as actors in it. He even obtains a substantial amount of money from them (ostensibly to prepare for the film). Mr. Ahankhah has his suspicions, however, especially when a magazine photo shows a younger Makhmalbaf with darker hair than that of Sabzian. He invites a journalist (Hossain Farazmand) over, who confirms Sabzian is indeed an impostor. The police come to arrest Sabzian, while Farazmand takes several pictures for his upcoming article: "Bogus Makhmalbaf Arrested." Kiarostami intersperses these scenes throughout the film, in which the events described above do not progress chronologically; they are re-enactments.
The story begins in 1973 Moscow, where Engineer Aleksandr (Shurik) Timofeev (Aleksandr Demyanenko) is working on a time machine in his apartment. By accident, he sends Ivan Vasilevich Bunsha (Yuri Yakovlev), superintendent of his apartment building, and George Miloslavsky (Leonid Kuravlev), a small-time burglar, back into the time of Ivan IV "The Terrible". The pair is forced to disguise themselves, with Bunsha dressing up as Ivan IV and Miloslavsky as a knyaz of the same name. At the same time, the real Ivan IV (also played by Yuri Yakovlev) is sent by the same machine into Shurik's apartment, he has to deal with modern-day life while Shurik tries to fix the machine so that everyone can be brought back to their proper place in time. Superintendent Bunsha and Tzar Ivan IV the Terrible are lookalikes but have completely different personalities, which results in funny situations of mistaken identity. As the police (tipped off by a neighbor who was burgled by Miloslavsky) close in on Shurik, who is frantically trying to repair the machine, the cover of Bunsha and Miloslavsky is blown and they have to fight off the Streltsy, who have figured out that Bunsha is an impostor. The movie ends with Bunsha, Miloslavsky, and Ivan IV all transported back to their proper places, although the entire episode is revealed to be a dream by Shurik.
Eight men eat breakfast at a Los Angeles diner before their planned diamond heist, most of them unknown to each other. Six of them use aliases: Mr. Blonde, Mr. Blue, Mr. Brown, Mr. Orange, Mr. Pink, and Mr. White. With them are mob boss Joe Cabot, the organizer of the heist, and his son/underboss, "Nice Guy" Eddie Cabot. During the course of the film, the major characters are sporadically introduced by subtitles (e.g., "Mr. White") and their character backstories are explored in subsequent, non-linear fashion.
Long-time friends and small-time criminals Eddy, Tom, Soap and Bacon put together £100,000 so that Eddy, a genius card shark, can buy into one of "Hatchet" Harry Lonsdale's weekly high-stakes three card brag games. The game is rigged however, and the friends end up massively indebted to Harry, who fully expects them not to be able to come up with the money before the deadline he gives them. He has his sights set on Eddy's father's bar as repayment, and sets his debt collector Big Chris (who is often accompanied by his beloved son, Little Chris) to work in order to ensure that some form of payment is coming up.
Tony "le Stéphanois" has served a five-year prison term for a jewel heist and is out on the street and down on his luck. His friend Jo approaches him about a smash-and-grab proposed by mutual friend Mario in which the threesome would cut the glass on a Parisian jeweler's front window in broad daylight and snatch some gems. Tony declines. He then learns that his old girlfriend, Mado, took up in his absence with gangster Parisian nightclub owner Pierre Grutter. Finding Mado working at Grutter's, Tony invites her back to his rundown flat. She is obviously well-kept, and Tony savagely beats her for being so deeply involved with Grutter. Tony changes his mind about the heist; he now accepts on the condition that they rob the jeweler's safe instead of the window. Mario suggests they employ the services of Italian compatriot César, a safecracker. The four devise and rehearse an ingenious plan to break into the store and disarm its sophisticated alarm system.
First-time crook Sonny Wortzik (Al Pacino), his friend Salvatore "Sal" Naturale (John Cazale), and Stevie (Gary Springer) attempt to rob the First Brooklyn Savings Bank. The plan immediately goes awry when Stevie loses his nerve shortly after Sal pulls out his gun, and Sonny is forced to let him flee the scene. In the vault, Sonny discovers that he and Sal have arrived after the daily cash pickup, and only $1,100 in cash remains in the bank.