One Hour Photo - Plot

Plot

Seymour "Sy" Parrish is a full-time photo technician at SavMart's one-hour photo developing clinic. He leads a depressing, solitary life outside of the "heaven-like", hyperreality atmosphere of the department store. Every day he labors to ensure his customers get the best quality photos possible. His work is his life, as he has no one and nothing to go home to at the end of each day. He feels that there is more to photography than meets the eye. If one only attends a two-day course, then he or she will not have a full appreciation of the art. As each workday comes to an end, Sy falls into the inescapable routine of spending his evenings sitting alone in his barren living room, watching television. The only thing in Sy's apartment he has for companionship is a hamster, caged in his bedroom.

His favorite customers are the Yorkin family: husband Will (Michael Vartan), wife Nina (Connie Nielsen), and their son, Jake (Dylan Smith). He has done their photos for years and over time, has developed an obsession with the family. He idolizes their happiness and affluence, memorizes every personal detail about them that he can learn, and finally begins to associate with them more and more. Sy secretly makes his own copies of the Yorkins' photos from the film negatives and then puts them on a wall in his apartment in a massive collage. Most of all, he fantasizes about being a member of their family and sharing in the love he assumes they must feel. He is painfully shy and socially inept. His awkward attempts to become closer to the family are gently rebuffed.

Sy eventually manages to spark a connection with Nina when he pretends to be interested in a book he noticed she had purchased on a particular day in the store. For the first time, Nina asks Sy personal questions about his life, realizing that he is indeed a lonely man, something only Jake had noticed earlier. Sy even suggests that the family should refer to him as 'Uncle Sy.' The next day, his boss Bill (Gary Cole) fires him for stealing prints. While inspecting his photos for the last time, Sy discovers that Will is having an affair, and his idyllic conception of the Yorkins as the "perfect" family is shattered. He comes to hate and envy Will, who has everything Sy longs for, yet does not seem to appreciate what he has.

After losing his job, Sy follows and takes pictures of Bill's young daughter as revenge for firing him, leading to a police investigation against him. While detectives Van Der Zee (Eriq La Salle) and Outerbridge (Clark Gregg) discover Sy's obsession, Sy confronts Will and his mistress, Maya (Erin Daniels), during a rendezvous in their hotel room. Armed with a knife and a camera, Sy forces the lovers to pose naked while he takes pictures. He does all that he can in order to humiliate the couple. After the confrontation, Sy discovers that the police have arrived in the hotel and attempts to escape. An alarm sounds and Van Der Zee pursues him while Outerbridge discovers Will and Maya, physically unharmed but deeply traumatized. After a chase, the police finally apprehend Sy in the parking garage as he attempts to make a break for his car. Upon being arrested, Sy claims, "I just took pictures".

The final scene takes place in a police interrogation room where Van Der Zee asks Sy why he terrorized the Yorkins. Sy replies that he can tell Van Der Zee is a good man and not the sort of father who would take "sick, degrading pictures" of his children. (The implication, confirmed by Romanek, is that Sy's father exploited him for child pornography). Sy asks the Detective personal questions about his family, which he does not answer. As the detective prepares to take his confession, Sy asks for the pictures he took at the hotel, which the detective has described as "evidence". They appear to be only shots of household objects and interior furnishings he (probably) took before the incident in the hotel. The film closes with a picture of the Yorkin family with Sy. Romanek claims in the DVD commentary that the picture is intended to symbolize an open ending; it is left up to the viewer to decide whether the picture only exists in Sy's mind or if he ever sees the Yorkin family again.