Two Supreme Court Justices are assassinated. Derby Shaw (Julia Roberts), a Tulane University Law Student, has a theory about these killings. She makes her findings into a paper-The Pelican Brief - and gives it to her Law Professor who in turn gives it to a friend in the F.B.I.But her professor is killed in a car bomb and then she knows that she is next. She goes into hiding and sought the help of Gray Grantham (Denzel Washington), a reporter, in order to help make her findings public.
Now both of them are marked for death and they must make their findings public -with absolute proof - before it's too late.
