Kresk (Steve Zahn) is a hairdresser who's down on his luck. His wife, Karen (Lara Flynn Boyle), is divorcing him, adding insult to injury by going on a vacation with their marriage counselor.

Kresk's first customer of the day turns out to be a gangster, Avnet (Jeff Goldblum), who's in possession of three ancient coins, stolen in a robbery in which two guards were killed. When Kresk accidentally overhears his phone conversation, Avnet attacks him, and, in the confused struggle that ensues, Kresk accidentally stabs Avnet in the neck with a pair of scissors, killing him.

Panic-stricken, Kresk seeks the help of a friend, Andy (David Cross), the sadistic leader of a Boy Scout troop. The two decide to dump Avnet's body in Karen's empty apartment -- and then hunt down the valuable coins.

They find the coins in Avnet's apartment, and as they are leaving they narrowly miss the appearance of an underage hit man, Mikey (Elijah Wood).

Flashbacks limn the events -- how the wealthy Bollingsworth (Tom Wilkinson) masterminded the coin robbery that went wrong when Avnet, against orders, killed the guards and fled with the booty.

Bollingsworth hired Mikey to kill Avnet, but the hit man now reports that the coins seem to be in the possession of Kresk.

Enter investigating cop Kolko (Hayek), a former Playmate of the Month who's the perpetual butt of her colleagues' jokes. She and Kresk quickly warm to each other.

The plot becomes really complicated when Bollingsworth tries to commit suicide and is saved by Kresk.

Script hardly carves out much original ground and is more amusing than wildly funny. More importantly, pic manages to keep a balance between humor and violence, with the latter never gory.

Flashbacks are efficiently used, for both clarification and mystification, and help to make the film surprisingly unpredictable.