I don't usually like romance movies. They drive me up a wall. Same with romance books. But perhaps because this was romantic in a weird way, I did really like it.
Swain plays a down-and-out white trash girl in Virginia, married to a creep named Edgar who robs stores to keep themselves afloat. They don't give you a background as to why she ever married this creep, but the bloom has worn off the rose and she just wants to get away from him now.
She's in love with a very pale young man who is a lawyer in their small Southern town. He's a big fish in a small pond and more to offer her then she's ever seen in her whole white trash life.
Edgar also has a best friend, a guy named "Flowers", for what reason I can't imagine, who hangs around Edgar and his wife all the time. Flowers is infatuated with Inez, Edgar's wife, but she finds him repulsive. He really is, at first--you have to look hard through all the dirt and bad clothing and beard to recognize pretty nice-looking Ari Verveen.
Edgar knows Inez is in love with someone else and after a fight, decides to keep her prisoner in her own house by chaining her to her bed at night and to the sofa daily, with Flowers standing guard while Edgar goes and does whatever it is he does.
Inez manages to convince Flowers to help her to get away from Edgar by murdering him for her. He doesn't really need a lot of convincing, since he wants her for himself.
These people are completely amoral and trashy, but there is still a beautiful kind of poetic romance to Flower's love for Inez. I loved the movie. Even if you hate romances, you may find it great too.
