As bacteriologist Lena (38) drives past a burning car, she hears a scream of a dying woman. Lena does not tell her boyfriend how much the incident distresses her, just as she does not talk about the stillbirth she recently had. Instead, she throws herself into her work, intrudes into the life of the deceased, begins an affair with the widower and gradually takes on the role of mother to their son. Her persistent insomnia causes her to lose control between dreams and reality. Finally she accepts the help of a whisperer and then finds her own way to cope with her lo
The last thing Eddie Mills (Larry Clarke) wants to do is go home to deal with his dying Dad (Brian Dennehy). But the Catholic guilt gnaws at him, and he returns home to his crazy family, an overbearing step-mother (Leslie Ann Warren) , and his bear of a father. Once there, Eddie is confronted with a revelation that forces him to deal with the past he has always avoided.
Set in the 1930s, an American with a scandalous reputation on both sides of the Atlantic must do an about-face in order to win back the woman of his dreams.