New York City professor Axel Freed (James Caan, The Godfather) is in crippling debt due to gambling addiction. He owes over forty thousand dollars to his bookie Hips (Paul Sorvino, Goodfellas), who has mob connections and threatens violence against Axel if he doesn’t pay his debts. Managing to borrow enough money from his mother to pay what he owes, Axel flees town with his girlfriend Billie (Lauren Hutton, American Gigolo) for Las Vegas, which thrusts him back into the world of gambling, resulting in an anxiety-inducing spiral of unpaid debts, violence and despair.