Brothers Treat and Phillip live by themselves in Newark, New Jersey.  Younger brother Phillip lives in fear of the outside world and never leaves the house.  Treat provides food and other resources for himself and his brother by stealing.  When Treat meets a wealthy man at a bar, he attempts to kidnap him by bringing him home that night.  Instead, the man becomes a father figure to the boys, teaching Phillip to fear less and Treat to act in a more even-tempered, honest way.