Offered a fancy job with a glossy L.A. firm, superstar deputy district attorney Willy (Ryan Gosling) has one teeny case to finish first – a case that will teach him the usual lessons about justice, power, and arrogant villainy. Willy's nemesis is Ted (Anthony Hopkins), who shoots his lovely younger wife, Jennifer (Embeth Davidtz), angry that she's been sleeping with a detective, Rob (Billy Burke). The fact that the adulterous couple don't tell each other their real names leads to increasing trouble for Rob -- and for Willy, who's charged with putting Ted in prison. Willy and Ted face off for the first time during a hearing at which Ted announces that he'll defend himself. It's easy to see that he knows exactly what he's doing, but because Willy is distracted, he doesn't take the case as "seriously" as he should. Willy's boss, Joe (David Strathairn), suggests that the young lawyer's impressive 97% conviction rate has something to do with how good he is at this particular job (putting criminals away, rather than getting them off), but Willy believes he deserves to move up. To this end, he falls for Nikki (Rosamund Pike), the woman who will be his boss at the swanky firm; she promises him a "trial by fire" in his first case and invites him into her bed to boot. She's pretty and well-appointed, but Willy soon finds himself more drawn to her father -- a wise, moral-minded judge (Bob Gunton) -- than he is to her. But not to worry. Willy's proper focus is the same as the film's: his relationship with Ted. They trade courtroom dramatics, then find themselves competing in more profound realms involving morality, life, and death.