Guang is a 38-year-old undocumented immigrant from Changle, Fujian Province, China, where his wife, Ming, and his 8-year-old son, Wang Yue, remain. Guang works as a food deliveryman for Happy Dragon Chinese Restaurant in the Bronx to earn money to bring his family to America, but first he has to pay off the remaining $80,000 of his $120,000 debt to Snakehead, the human trafficker who arranged passage for Guang and his 22-year-old nephew to the Unites States, hidden away in the bowels of a container ship.

At 6:55 p.m. on a Friday, after Guang makes a delivery to the 38th floor of an apartment building, his elevator malfunctions, dropping more than 30 floors, sticking briefly at the 7^th floor, falling again, and then stopping for good between the third and fourth floors. The elevator is stuck.  The doors won’t open. Guang debates pushing the alarm button to call for help.  He is reluctant to try the intercom, fearing that if the police show up, they will want to see the immigration papers he does not have. He decides to wait for a repairman or a resident to notice that the elevator is out of commission.  It’s a holiday weekend.  No one notices.

Guang marks time not only in minutes (then hours), but also by the amount of tip money he is losing to his friend/competitor, Marco, a rival deliveryman from Tlaxcala, Mexico, to whom he sold his cell phone days earlier.

Guang wonders if he should try to break down the elevator’s doors like his macho brother-in-law, the ex-soldier Zhong Yi, would do. Zhong Yi found a new girlfriend, abandoned Guang’s pregnant sister, and moved to Hong Kong. Zhong Yi’s son (Guang’s nephew) was on his way to America with Guang but was overcome by dehydration during the long passage across the ocean.

Guang begins to eat the fortune cookies and sauce packets that he carries with him on deliveries. He thinks about his wife and son, and even imagines they are with him. He remembers how he used to whisper poems to Ming, his wife, while they lay in bed. He imagines her calling his cell phone only to have his co-worker Marco answer her in Spanish. This scene gives way to anxiety dreams about his job and the money he owes Snakehead, the human trafficker who got him to the USA at a high cost. Guang becomes angry at the elevator and the people in the apartment complex.  He is sure they would notice him if he were the food he delivered to them, instead of an invisible, faceless immigrant.

Guang’s mind wanders back to when he and his nephew’s traveled across the sea in a cramped cargo container and the time when he was mugged at gunpoint and lost $200. The memory of his assailant becomes his own bladder.  Guang wets himself in his sleep. He wakes up ashamed.

As Guang begins to fade from worsening thirst and hunger, his world becomes increasingly surreal.

The elevator buttons become the buttons on a slot machine in Atlantic City, and when he hits the alarm, he wins the jackpot, but soon realizes that his winning green card ticket is a takeout menu.  Later, he speaks into one of the takeout menus he is carrying, folds it into a paper airplane, and sends it across continents and oceans to his wife. She responds, expressing her unhappiness at remaining in China as a factory worker. An airplane letter from his disappointed son follows—he wonders when he will be able to join his father in America.

Guang dreams that he is competing in a pro-wrestling match, announced by Marco, with a monster version of the elevator. After going two rounds with the Elevator Monster, Guang tags out.  Fortune Cookie Monster tags into his place and does some damage to Elevator Monster. Gaining the upper hand, Elevator Monster rips off Fortune Cookie Monster’s mask to reveal Ming. Ming is taken hostage, while a stunned Guang watches helplessly.  

Guang wakes up. It was a dream. He has been stuck in the elevator now for 38 hours straight.

Hunger overtakes Guang. The pain of hunger weaves itself into the pain of being separated from his family. Zhong Yi appears and tries to convince Guang to forget about his family. If he did, he could use the money he has been saving to start his own restaurant, a buffet. Ming and Wang Yue appear and plead to Guang to not abandon them.

Guang becomes disoriented. Immigration agents enter.  They mock and attack Guang.  The ICE agents beat Guang when he resists.  Guang thinks he is dying and sings a farewell song to his wife. But he then discovers that what he thinks is blood is actually his last packet of hot sauce which has leaked into his pocket. Guang’s imagines the city of New York waking up with dawn, as he would begin his daily deliveries. The elevator fades away around him. Guang is bicycling through the early morning sky over NYC.  He flies over the city, buoyed by a choir of voices of city workers and immigrants. He feels at one with the world.

There is “bing” sound. The elevator doors open — 81 hours after trapping him.  Guang sits up.  He is finally free. He hesitantly steps out of the elevator, looks around the deserted hallway.  Guang tentatively walks down the dusky corridor and steps into the city which embraces him in its noise and darkness.   The indifferent sounds of the city begin to rise - louder, louder, louder and…  BLACKOUT