Trainhopper is the story of Samuel, a young man who ran away from his home after a terrible tragedy.
With sole companions a small bag of clothes and his father's old camcorder, Samuel begins trainhopping aimlessly around the country for four years, living a life in limbo.
One day, the train Samuel is on stops in Durham, North Carolina and Samuel is arrested for illegally trainhopping. Unable to afford the large fine, Samuel is offered a choice: go to jail or work as a cameraman for an ambitious young woman.
Throughout Trainhopper there is action, there is comedy, but above all there is a solitary Samuel who we see slowly fall back into life, ultimately torn apart between living a life with attachments and a life without.