Warren Schmidt (Jack Nicholson) is set adrift following retirement and the sudden death of his wife. Uncertain about his future as well as his past, he packs up his 30-foot Winnebago to set out on a journey across the Nebraska plains to attend his daughter's (Hope Davis) wedding to a waterbed salesman (Dermot Mulroney). But every step he takes seems wrong, and Warren seems destined to end his life as he lived it: a failure. But along the way, Warren recounts his journey and shares his observations with an unexpected friend - a poor Tanzanian boy he is sponsoring for 73 cents a day. In his long letters to the boy, Warren begins to see himself and the life he has lived with new eyes.