1960's Minnesota and, with autobiographical undertones, the Coen brothers focus on on a Jewish academic couple and their young adolescent sons. Physics professor Larry Gopnik's life is unravelling around him. His wife Judith is preparing to leave him, his unemployable brother Arthur is sleeping on the couch, his children are constantly in trouble and, to top it all, a poison-pen writer is trying to sabotage his career chances. In a world where everyone seems to have abandoned him, will Larry ever find what he is looking for?