Gene Hackman plays an ex-President of the United States, Monroe Cole, whose main ego-driven goal is to retire to his summer home in the sleepy town of Mooseport, Maine, reap lecture fees and a book deal for more money than his predecessor and fight off his shark of an ex-wife (Christine Baranski). He also looks forward to a presidential library that will be the biggest ever.

Plans go awry when the locals ask him to become mayor, an invitation he accepts, but a shy hardware store proprietor and plumber, Handy Harrison, played by Ray Romano of "Everybody Loves Raymond" television fame, decides to run too. There are complications within the complications. Cole hits on Sally (Maura Tierney), the girlfriend of Harrison, who has waited too long to ask her to marry him, thereby rendering her resentful. The political rivalry in the race for mayor also becomes a contest for who'll get the girl. Meanwhile, Marcia Gay Harden is nicely reserved portraying Cole's long-time aide Grace, who is secretly in love with him.

As you should be able to see by now, this is an awful lot for Tom Schulman's screenplay to carry and director Donald Petrie to pull together. The film gets more and more ridiculous, although momentarily rescued here and there by a few funny bits. For example, Cole thinks he is a great golfer, thanks to the habit of his secret servicemen hiding among the trees and tossing out balls to give him better position than the balls he hits astray.