In the seedy part of Los Angeles, a man who writes poetry has spent six months without leaving his apartment because of his paranoid delusions involving sadistic doctors, rappers, and spiders. A woman who seems to jinx things by wanting to help is dumped by her boyfriend and finds herself penniless on the streets, and soon runs afoul of a local gang. Due to a telephone glitch, the man calls her at a phone booth trying to dial a "talk line" and invites her to his place. There they must help each other to overcome their respective problems.

Fed up of his business partner, Ernest Trend hires the services of two exterminators. When things go drastically wrong and they murder the wrong man, the race is on to frame an innocent video surveillance man.