Struggling salesman Lenny Brown (James Woods) gets his big break when real estate speculator Max Sherman (Steven Hill) offers him a prime sales position at his Los Angeles firm. The economic boom of the mid-1980s soon has Lenny and his wife, Linda (Sean Young), living in the fast lane, but when a sudden tax-law change causes the real estate bubble to burst, Lenny finds himself unemployed and in debt. At this low point, the couple's once-casual cocaine habit begins to spiral out of control.