Tony Richardson's final film gained Jessica Lange the Best Actress Academy Award for her portrayal of Carly Marshall, the unbalanced and unfaithful wife of army scientist Hank (Tommy Lee Jones). Her unruly antics get the both of them in trouble and result finally, after a stint of topless sunbathing, in them being thrown off their current army base in Hawaii and relocated to Alabama. But when Hank resolves to expose a nuclear test accident in which two civilians were irradiated, it seems that the family's troubles are only just beginning.