When a million dollar life insurance policy comes up for collection the company always opens a case. When a million dollar policy held by notorious con artist Kelvin Anderson comes up for collection the company sends the best to investigate. And so they dispatch Holt (Forrest Whitaker) a wool capped and beiged mannered claims investigator. The assignment soon takes Holt to the snowy small town of Hastings to confirm Kelvin s death. He senses deception from the start. So begins a dramatic emotional tangle with the policy s single beneficiary. Kelvin s sister Isold (Julia Stiles) and her volatile husband Fred Jeremy Renner.