Nomad (2002)

Jack is the nomad of the film's title. He is a homeless street performer who brings Shakespeare's soliloquies to life each afternoon on various street corners around the city of Denver. He moves around the urban landscape from park bench to bus bench with his best friend, an aging dog named Bones. Contrary to the homeless stereotype, Jack's existence is ruled by discipline. He carefully plans every day of his life, leaving nothing to chance. Lucy is a theater student at the city university. She comes upon Jack's performance one afternoon. Fascinated, she pursues him, bent on learning who he is and where he comes from. When Lucy discovers Jack is from the neighborhood she grew up in, she is determined to learn how this man could fall from the comfort of suburbia to living on the streets. They begin an unlikely friendship. She travels to various locations of Jack's performances, accompanying him afterwards to his bench. She is intrigued by his knowledge of Shakespeare, manner of living and the fifteen perfectly organized bags beneath his bench. They spend their afternoons discussing theater and Lucy's role as Antigone in a school loneliness of the city more bearable. Jack has a history with Charlie, a transient who portrays a typical image of the homeless: rough, unshaven and always looking for the next drink. When Jack rebuffs Charlie's alcoholic advances, an enemy is born. Nomad explores the futility of insulating oneself from the sometimes painful reality of human interaction. Through an unforeseeable chain of events, Jack comes face to face with the boundaries of his carefully constructed existence.