톰 조드는 감옥에서 막 출소하여 어머니와 가족이 있는 곳으로 돌아온다. 어쩌다 싸움에 휘말렸다가 실수로 사람을 죽여 4년을 복역한 뒤 가석방된 것이다. 하지만 돌아온 현실은 어둡기만 하다. 지독한 가뭄 그리고 거대 회사와 은행 빚에 쪼들리다 못해 가족은 쫓겨나기 직전이다. 마침내 톰 조드의 가족은 일자리가 넘친다는 낙원의 땅 캘리포니아로 이주를 결정한다. 고물 트럭에 삼대가 모두 타고 길을 떠난다. 한때는 마을의 존경받는 목사였으나 지금은 걸인이 된 케이시도 그들과 함께 간다. 하지만 우여곡절 끝에 도착한 그곳은 듣던 것과 다르다. 여기도 악독한 농장주들이 폭력과 술수를 동원해 배고픈 하층민들을 갈취하고 있다. 톰 조드는 이 모든 과정을 겪으며 사회를 보는 새로운 눈, 사회 개혁 의지를 갖게 된다.
Marcia, a pretty young girl, goes to work as a model for a lecherous dress-shop owner. She resists his advances, despite his giving her expensive gifts. One day Mrs. Reilly, a prominent society woman and a customer of the shop, invites Marcia to a party she's throwing. Marcia winds up impersonating a famous writer in order to impress a "duke" for Mrs. Reilly, who doesn't know the "duke" isn't really a duke. Complications ensue.
Bill Crane is a fun-loving cowboy who likes to play pranks with an Australian bull-whip, much to the dismay of his ranch-owning uncle, Pete Perry. Bill and his cousin, Jack Perry, compete for the affections of Mary Pinkleby. Jack, unknown to Bill, is also an outlaw gang-leader, known as Poncho. The latter frames Bill as being the gang leader, and now Bill has to elude the sheriff and also prove his own innocence.
When a trio of criminals kidnap a rich man's daughter and nurse, a detective goes undercover into the Italian-immigrant ghetto where they're being held.
The film carries the slogan: ‘He Stole From the Rich to Give to the Poor’. It is a story of the ‘nobleman-bandit’, Brennan O'Malley, who is captured and imprisoned, but an attempt to drown him through flooding his cell fails. Recaptured after his escape from prison, he overwhelms a soldier and escapes again. He then holds up Lord Hastings and changes into his clothes. He escapes through a secret passage with Betty, Lady Lorrequer whom he had earlier rescued and with whom he had fallen in love. The couple cross a chasm with the aid of a human chain to elude Lord Hastings' troop of soldiers. In the pursuit, Hastings falls into the sea and is killed, while Brennan and Betty escape by ship.
