It's 1969. A spur-of-the-moment road trip. A borrowed car. A dubious destination. Two flaky hippies. What could possibly go wrong? Everything.
Cruiser and Peanut, two aimless Miami stoners, are returning a car for a tourist from Kentucky who's gone romping on his new lover's yacht. Arriving at their destination, the pair stumble onto a multiple murder. Before long, the duo are on the lam as the prime suspects with an unhinged FBI agent and a mob contract killer hot on their trail.
Nestled slyly into this madcap road trip is the cultural awakening of two young Miami refugees, one from Cuba, the other from Georgia. Being a hippie is more a fashion statement than a lifestyle for Cruiser and Peanut, the offspring of working-class parents who, like most migrants, came to Miami seeking a better life. After venturing outside their inner-city world for the first time, the pair discover a form of hippie heresy: The flower child ethos of dropping out and going back to the land feels less like liberation and more like a step back to the hardships their parents fled in Havana and Waycross.