Jerry, a small-town Minnesota car salesman is bursting at the seams with debt... but he's got a plan. He's going to hire two thugs to kidnap his wife in a scheme to collect a hefty ransom from his wealthy father-in-law. It's going to be a snap and nobody's going to get hurt... until people start dying. Enter Police Chief Marge, a coffee-drinking, parka-wearing - and extremely pregnant - investigator who'll stop at nothing to get her man. And if you think her small-time investigative skills will give the crooks a run for their ransom... you betcha!

Retired farmer and widower Alvin Straight learns one day that his distant brother Lyle has suffered a stroke and may not recover. Alvin is determined to make things right with Lyle while he still can, but his brother lives in Wisconsin, while Alvin is stuck in Iowa with no car and no driver's license. He then has the idea of making the trip on his old lawnmower, thus beginning a picturesque and at times deeply spiritual odyssey.

Caroline, a young waitress who seems to have bad taste in men, is on her way home one night when thugs attempt to rape her. Adam, the mysterious busboy who works at the same diner, helps fight off the assailants, and she begins a relationship with him -- but not all their fellow Minnesotans are happy for them. Meanwhile, the couple face their own difficulties when Caroline finds about Adam's past, including his unique health condition.

A married woman is reunited with her childhood sweetheart, and marries him too, forcing her to live two lives at once.

After a solar flare powers down her remote community, Alma discovers her husband Terry comatose. Suspecting he is having an out-of-body affair with an ex-lover, Alma attempts to bring him back to reality with help from Terry's estranged, drug-addled son and the leader of a new-age religion that specializes in astral travel.

Middle-aged and divorced, Wilson finds himself lonely, smug, and obsessed with his past.

This drama centers on Hank Chinaski, the fictional alter-ego of "Factotum" author Charles Bukowski, who wanders around Los Angeles, CA trying to live off jobs which don't interfere with his primary interest, which is writing. Along the way, he fends off the distractions offered by women, drinking and gambling.

A fictionalized account of the first major successful sexual harassment case in the United States — Jenson vs. Eveleth Mines, where a woman who endured a range of abuse while working as a miner filed and won the landmark 1984 lawsuit.

Two twentysomething students, Alex and Zoe, are lovers. When Zoe's old boyfriend James returns from Europe, Zoe breaks up with Alex and returns to James. But soon Zoe finds out she's pregnant, and it's Alex's baby.

In 1862, when Minnesota was still a young state, the people of the Eastern Dakota Nation had been relegated to a reservation on a narrow strip of land along the Minnesota River. Times were hard and Dakota families went hungry. When the U.S. government broke its promises and failed to send treaty payments, some of the Dakota went to war against the white settlers. Many Dakota did not join in, choosing to aid and protect settlers instead. The fighting lasted six weeks and many people on both sides were killed or fled the state. 1600 Dakota were imprisoned in a camp below Fort Snelling in present day Minneapolis. Dakota men were tried in a military court and on December 26, 1862, thirty-eight were hanged in Mankato in the largest mass execution in U.S. history.