"Sweet and Lowdown" tells the story, documentary fashion, of a supposedly true character, Emmet Ray (Sean Penn). Ray is a brilliant jazz guitarist in the 1930's, who possesses a genius for music but has struck a sour note in his personal life. Although he is regarded as the second most talented jazz artist of the time, in his private life he still resembles the pimp he started out as - all flash and no heart, especially with the women unlucky enough to come into his life. An encounter with Hattie (Samantha Morton), a shy, mute laundry lady, opens his eyes to the possibility of real love. But instead, he falls back on his old ways and takes up with eye-candy Blanche (Uma Thurman). Eventually he learns a hard lesson about which woman has real value.