The story start out with four old army friends get together after long period of time and go over how everyone life has turned out since their time in vientnam war. The story flashes back to mid 90s when a retiered amry general (Tom Hanks) moves into a small town where he loved by everyone on in the town. He participates in every events, takes care of kids and pets and goes to church every sunday. One night he is driving home when he loses control of his car and crashes. His was hospitalized and his wife died in the crash. With no insurance he had to sell everything he had to pay all the bills, which left him homeless and no where to go. While sitting at chruch many people came and donted money to him, one family (george clooney's) invite him to stay with them until Tom is ready to move out.
As time goes by a murder takes place in the surrunding town. Every week there is a new murder report. One day George comes home to find out that his wife was murdered and Tom was Crying in the other room. Facing the disaster in his home, George starts doing research on Tom and finds out that He was convicted of 7 murders while in army and has lived in towns that had murdurs take place. After putting everything in order George goes to Tom to get revenge for killing his wife. After few punches and arguing about many different murders, Tom rememebers George from his early army days, when George was discharged and Tom got the promotion. George has been following Tom ever since killing people and setting up to be blamed on Tom.