 Stanley Yelnats IV (Shia LaBeouf) is falsely accused of stealing Clyde  Sweet Feet  Livingston (Rick Fox) s shoe donation to a local orphanage and will either go to jail or  Camp Green Lake.  Stanley chooses Green Lake, where he is forced to dig large holes in the desert each day, by order of the mysterious Warden (Sigourney Weaver) and her assistants Mr. Sir (Jon Voight) and Mr. Pendanski (Tim Blake Nelson). But what the Warden is really trying to do is find a buried treasure that was cracked murderer Kissin  Kate Barlow (Patricia Arquette) s fortune long ago. But when Stanley and his friend Zero (Khleo Thomas) escape, things get really bad.