Don McKay [Thomas Haden Church] is a lonely high school janitor whose quiet routine is interrupted when a letter arrives from his former sweetheart, Sonny [Elisabeth Shue]. The note invites him back to their hometown because she is dying of an unnamed disease. Despite a lingering fear from being a suspect in a long-ago murder, he decides to return. A wry, talkative cab ride with the eccentric Samuel [M. Emmet Walsh] sets the mood as Don heads toward a town that still feels like a memory.
In Sonny’s house he meets the chilly Marie [Melissa Leo], who tends to keep him at arm’s length, and Sonny herself, who appears frail yet carries an air of unresolved emotions. The night is intimate, and Don and Sonny reconnect, sharing a fragile tenderness that softens the years of distance between them. The next morning, Sonny’s doctor, Dr. Lance Pryce [James Rebhorn], arrives, and the morning takes a dark turn when Pryce attacks Don during a moment when Marie and Sonny aren’t watching. A desperate struggle ends with Don killing Pryce and fleeing, only to wake later in a hospital where Sonny suggests they should be married.
Don confides in his old friend Otis Kent [Keith David] about the events, hoping for help in making sense of what happened. Otis agrees to assist in disposing of the body, but when they search for it, the corpse has vanished. Sonny reappears in a rush, convinced there are burglars about, and Otis bolts. The incident leaves Don rattled, and he retreats for a spell, though another letter from Sonny asks him to come back.
Samuel reappears to pick Don up, but the situation spirals when they’re intercepted by Mel [Pruitt Taylor Vince], who, along with Marie, has been plotting a far more calculated scheme. They reveal a supposed inheritance Don would receive upon marriage, pressuring him to go along with a plan to kill him if he refuses to cooperate. Don insists there is no inheritance and that he has no idea what they’re talking about, but Marie refuses to listen. The four drive toward Sonny’s house with Samuel in Mel’s trunk, and Don is coerced into wearing a wire as a way to trap him into going along with the plot.
At the house, Don makes a hurried declaration of love to Sonny, hoping to defuse the trap. The doorbell rings, and Marie and Mel step inside. A long confrontation ensues; Sonny, acting with surprising ferocity, hits Marie over the head with a frozen ham, knocking her unconscious. When the smoke clears, Sonny calls 911, pretending a private detective has killed someone in the house. She urges Don to kill Mel, but he gasps and refuses. Mel then turns his attention to Don, and a brutal struggle for an axe ensues.
In a dramatic reversal, Sonny kills Mel with the same frozen ham she used on Marie, and begins spinning a cover story to explain the carnage. The truth finally surfaces: Sonny is not Sonny at all—Don realizes he had killed her and two friends in a fire when he was eighteen, an act that sent him fleeing town and writing letters as a form of atonement. The truth shatters the illusion, and Sonny reveals her real name to be Joanne, exposing a web of deception that she built around the past and around Don.
Police arrive and arrest Don as Sonny/Joanne is led away in a car. Samuel is found and questioned, and his testimony, combined with the wire Don wore, clears him enough for the authorities to release him. Samuel hands Don a business-like, rueful parting word and a phone number, reminding him that if he ever needs anything, he should call.
Back home, Don sits quietly in a chair, a wasp landing on his cheek as the final image lingers. The film closes on an unresolved note, leaving Don’s fate uncertain and the future he imagined hanging in the balance.
- The journey through memory, guilt, and manipulation is framed by a tense, character-driven dynamic, where quiet moments can harbor dangerous truths and a single choice can alter a life’s trajectory.
- The film balances noirish suspense with a tragic, almost intimate examination of longing, accountability, and the sometimes-blurred line between love and manipulation.
- Throughout, the ensemble cast delivers a steady rhythm of ambiguity and danger, with Thomas Haden Church delivering a quietly haunted performance as Don, and Elisabeth Shue revealing the layers of a character who is both tender and dangerous in equal measure.
