Free-spirited con Randle P. McMurphy (Jack Nicholson) fakes insanity and moves into the state mental hospital with what he calls the "nuts." Immediately, his contagious sense of disorder runs up against numbing routine. This means war! On one side is McMurphy. On the other soft-spoken Nurse Ratched (Louise Fletcher), among the most coldly monstrous villains in film history. At stake is the fate of every patient on the ward.

A peaceful farmer turns Confederate renegade to avenge the deaths of his wife and child at the hands of bandits-turned-Union sympathizers.