A one-dimensional diffusion model was developed to investigate contaminant distributions in unsaturated soils beneath a landfill. On the basis of the assumption that the volume water content is a linear function of depth, the analytical solution of the model was obtained by using the method of separation of variables combined with generalized orthogonal theory. The results obtained by the proposed analytical solution agree well with those obtained by the finite element software COMSOL Multiphysics 4.2. The proposed analytical solution can be degraded to the steady-state solution. When the maximum volume water content of 0.6 and minimum volume water content of 0.3 is assumed for an unsaturated soil, the 100-year contaminant flux at the bottom of unsaturated soil was 91 g/ha/a, which is 1.4 times greater than that of the case assuming porosity of 0.3 for the saturated and 0.7 times less than that with a saturated volume water content of 0.6. When the sum of the top and bottom volume water content of the unsaturated soil remains constant, the relative concentration at the bottom of the soil will decrease with increase of the volume water content at the top of the soil. The bottom contaminant flux was not greatly affected by the variation of the distribution of volume water content when the sum of the top and bottom volume water content remains constant. The proposed analytical solution is relatively simple, and can be used for verification of complicated numerical models, experimental data fitting, and preliminary design of landfill liner systems.