It's the dog days of summer 1959. A rebellious teenager living in Newark, New Jersey, is convinced that the only way out of his impoverished neighborhood is to enlist in the ranks of the local Bloomfield Avenue mobsters and take up a life of crime. His father has a different agenda. He himself is a downtrodden racketeer and he wants to turn his troubled life around and the life and future of his young son.
Suddenly, on the eve of the boy's sixteenth birthday, both find themselves way over their heads in trouble and slipping into the dangerous clutches of a powerful mob boss who rules his domain with an iron fist from the confines of his Bloomfield Avenue Social Club. As danger threatens, both father and son realize that there is only one way out.
A series of life-changing events unfold, and in a hurried effort to keep him out of harm's way, the boy is sent away. He is forced to leave his family, his beloved Bloomfield Avenue, and the arms of his young girlfriend. He leaves as a boy but vows to return one day as a man.