Synopsis

Sixteen-year-old Dedee Truitt runs away from her troubled Louisiana home and turns up at her gay half-brother Bill's Indiana house. After seducing Bill's boyfriend and claiming he fathered her unborn child, Dedee steals money and heads west. Bill, his grieving friend Lucia, and a local sheriff pursue her, while the pursuit exposes the damage caused by sex, deception, grief, and the fear of genuine relationships.

Factoids & Trivia

• Principal photography began on June 8, 1997, and the film was shot in Los Angeles through July.

• Sony Pictures Classics acquired the film shortly before its world premiere at the 1998 Sundance Film Festival.

• The production was the final film made by Rysher Entertainment before the company shut down its film unit.

• Dedee's sarcastic, in-character voice-over became one of the film's defining stylistic devices. Roger Ebert praised it as though the movie contained its own running commentary.

• The film won the Independent Spirit Award for Best First Feature and also received recognition at the Seattle International Film Festival and the Satellite Awards.

• The title reflects the film's central idea that sex does not necessarily unite people. In Dedee's view, its consequences can instead produce isolation, disease, children, and unwanted emotional commitments.