Now, Cassavetes provides a startling and all-too-real look at contemporary youth culture with Alpha Dog, which tracks 72 hours in the lives of a group of Southern California teens - three days when everything suddenly spins out of control. And over the course of three days under the hot California sun, something does. Young, flush with money and at the center of their self-created universe - life for Johnny and his friends doesn't come with any consequences. Johnny has a wad of cash, a beautiful girl on each arm, a thriving business and plenty of weed to keep all his friends stoned. The model of the good life they imitate comes to them from rap music, video games and movies, and they spend their conscious hours copying the thug existence they idolize. For Johnny and his crew of bros, wannabes and suck-ups - landlocked in their suburban existence and burdened with too much time - their existence is a heady blur of partying and looking for the next thrill.

In Alpha Dog, Cocky and headstrong Johnny Truelove (EMILE HIRSCH) is living the thug wannabe's American dream as a mid-level drug dealer in a comfortable sector of the sprawling, privileged neighborhoods in Los Angeles' San Gabriel Valley. Versatile filmmaker NICK CASSAVETES (The Notebook, John Q) directs an impressive group of both young and veteran performers in Alpha Dog - inspired by actual events - a film that follows three fateful days when the lives of a group of Southern California teens suddenly dead-ended. You don't know why, but you can never go back?' - Johnny Truelove 'You ever have that dream: the one where you did something.

Alpha dog movie plot