George and Lennie are two itinerant ranch hands who arrive in California's Salinas Valley during the Great Depression, after being run off from their last assignment up north. Lennie possesses great physical strength but has the intellectual capacity of a child. George is the more calculating of the pair, but even he gets caught up in Lennie's dreams of owning a farm. As they find work and try to build a stake that will bring them closer to their dream, George and Lennie discover how easily Fate can upset their best-laid plans.--commonsensemedia.org