As a CIA employee in charge of guarding top secret documents, all-American Christopher Boyce (Timothy Hutton) becomes disillusioned with his country and decides to make a deal with the Soviet Union. Boyce drags his childhood friend Daulton Lee (Sean Penn) into the arrangement, but the drug-addicted Lee's reasons for committing espionage are strictly monetary. John Schlesinger directs this provocative and sometimes humorous account.